There are between a dozen and 20 active cases taken against the State over private nursing home charges that could result in further liabilities, a committee has heard.
The Oireachtas Health Committee was told there were over 100 “live” cases but that only a fraction of them were considered to be active and could result in further liabilities.
The committee also heard there had been no new cases taken since 2013, and that the last case had been settled in 2017.
Asked why these cases had not been settled, the Department of Health secretary general Robert Watt said he did not know.
“There are a number of cases, I understand, which are still active. So there’s a potential for the State to incur liability in relation to those cases,” he said.
When asked by TD Gino Kenny exactly how many cases there were, he said “a dozen, a score maybe of active ones”.
“There are lots of cases that are active, I think about a hundred, but there’s been no movement on those for a long time. No statement of claims has been issued in respect of many of them. There’s been no movement on the case for a significant time. I guess they’re live, but they’re not active,” he said.
Mr Watt said these cases, taken by families of the people with medical cards who received nursing home care, were at “various stages” of seeking damages against the State.
“They’re looking for, deputy, to be compensated or refunded for the charges that they incurred for private nursing homes in respect of people who had medical cards during that period (pre-2005),” he said.
“So these cases were initiated during various periods from 2006/07/08/09/10. (There have been) no new cases since 2013.”
Asked why the cases had not been settled, Mr Watt said “I don’t know deputy.
“The cases are in dispute, the state of claims in many cases have not been put forward so that the facts are not clear.”
He said that the cases could yet be settled.
Representatives of the Department of Health appeared before the health committee on Wednesday to answer questions about the way the State had handled charging people for nursing home care decades ago.
Although a State scheme was set up in 2004 to repay people with medical cards who were charged for public nursing home care, the State has said it had always contested whether medical card-holders were entitled to be repaid for private nursing homes.
A government memo released to the Irish Mail on Sunday by a health whistle-blower indicated that there was a legal strategy to settle cases with medical card-holders in private nursing homes.
The 2011 memo indicated this was done to avoid losing a court case which risked prompting further cases to be taken.
Social Democrats co-leader Roisin Shortall said it was not clear why the total payout of €480 million under the 2004 repayment scheme was so “low”, given estimates at the time indicated it could cost €1 billion .
The TD also criticised the department for not providing the committee with requested documents about the scheme.
“I understood we had requested those, for example, the memos and it would also be helpful if we had some detail on the public documentation associated with the repayment scheme in 2004,” she said.
“Because it’s hard to know why the final outcome of that repayment scheme was so low given the fact that there was illegal overcharging going back over so many years, so it’d be helpful to know what were the constraints on people making claims under that scheme.”
Mr Watt said: “So an estimate of a billion was the number that was set out there. That was an estimate of the number of claims that would come forward, the estimate of the legal costs, and the actual settlement.
“There’s a number of different factors, at least three different factors. And as I understand, there’s a calculation of the charges made, then there was a calculation of the State support and then there was an uplift in relation to CPI (consumer price index).
“I guess the significant element is that … the number of people that came forward and there was a large number of almost 30,000 people did come forward, but 22,500 people were ultimately in receipt of payments under the scheme.”
Ms Shortall responded: “Just making the point the estimates seem very far out – either the estimates were wrong, or there wasn’t sufficient awareness among people who were entitled to claim, and it would be helpful then to have the documentation.”
Committee chair Sean Crowe said that although the committee may have been too broad in its request, the documentation had been requested. Mr Watt replied that he was surprised.
“I’ll come back chair, I’m surprised now, there’s a lot of information given, published in the last two weeks,” he said.
