While the Fair Deal scheme only offers funding for nursing home care in its current form, the bill introduced by Fianna Fáil proposes that alternative home care services should be available when people request it and “such home care services are lest costly than the proposed long-term residential care”.

Fianna Fáil estimates that €1bn is currently spent on residential care. The party’s spokesman on social protection Willie O’Dea TD said that home care services typically represent between one third and one quarter of the cost of residential care to the State. “We want to ensure that we get the best value for the money we spend,” he said, adding: “The vast majority of people would prefer to be looked after in the safety and security of their own home, and their families would support them.”

Asked by the Irish Farmers Journal whether home care should be funded in the same way as nursing home care under the current Fair Deal scheme including contributions from the value of patient’s assets such as farmland, O’Dea said this was a matter for the Government to decide. Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People Helen McEntee said last week that she would open consultations on a proposed home care scheme shortly, but implementation would take more time and Fianna Fáil suggests that the Fair Deal scheme be expanded to home care in the meantime.

Farm assets liability “not sustainable”

Fianna Fáil’s health spokesman Billy Kelleher TD said that the current Fair Deal rules, exposing a family farm to being stripped of its land assets to cover nursing home charges, were “not sustainable”. Here again, the Government is expected to publish the results of consultations shortly, including an IFA proposal to protect farming assets from liability under the scheme. “We’re waiting for them to make an announcement and obviously we’ll adjudicate it, but I do believe that they have to accept that you cannot consistently undermine the capacity of a farm to support the family by stripping the asset base on it to fund long-term residential care for family members,” said Kelleher.

Listen to Willie O’Dea and Billy Kelleher in our podcast below:

Listen to “Fianna Fáil on Fair Deal scheme” on Spreaker.

The situation of farmers interviewed by the Irish Farmers Journal this week illustrates the need for reform. A dairy farmer in Co Cork said she was at risk of losing one third of her milking platform if her mother, who suffers from dementia, entered a nursing home. Meanwhile, a Co Kildare drystock farmer said she could easily take care of her 83-year-old grandmother at home if she had help for one hour every morning, but the waiting list is too long for her to access this service publicly.

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