Labour's health proposals are nothing but false empty promises - Cllr John Brady

Sinn Féin General Election candidate for Wicklow-East Carlow, Councillor John Brady, has described the Labour Party proposals for health care as "nothing but false and empty promises."

He also spoke out against Labour Party Leader Joan Burton's claim, that the crisis in this state is over.

Councillor Brady said;

"The Labour Party is responsible for a huge range of broken promises in relation to health care and addressing the health crisis.

“These broken promises and pledges have included reform of the HSE, the introduction and implementation of Universal Health Insurance and free prescriptions, and the safeguarding of the disability allowance.

"The Labour Party and Fine Gael willingly made a political choice to bring our health system to near ruin. The health care policies of the coalition has been the emphasis on the erosion of our public health service and replacing it with private health care.

"The Labour Party, including their TD in Wicklow-East Carlow, Anne Ferris, have failed in counteracting the worst of Fine Gael's right-wing agenda. It is due to their policies that that 92,998 patients were on trolleys in 2015 - a 37 percent increase from 2013.

“However, as Labour Party is asking to be returned to Government in coalition with Fine Gael it makes their false empty promises even more irrelevant, a coalition led by Fine Gael will continue to prioritise tax cuts for higher earners than on delivering a quality health care system at the expense of ordinary people.

“I found it ludicrous that Joan Burton would claim, on live the television, that "the “crisis is over”, if anything the crisis has gotten worse. It was incomprehensible for the Tánaiste to make this claim while our public services are being decimated. The crisis is very much a reality and it has seeped down into our hospitals in the most catastrophic of ways.

"Unlike the last coalition, citizens and our public services will be better off under Sinn Féin's vision and credible policies for health care, which have been costed.

“We are committed to introducing fully free and easily accessible healthcare, increasing capacity whilst also prioritising mental health care.”