If the economy is growing by 3 or 4 per cent annually, then the health service should be seeking increases in its budget of the same amount, the Minister for Health has said. Leo Varadkar said there was little point in economic recovery if it did not mean more money in people's pockets or in improved services. However, in the past the provision of increased resources had not always resulted in better services.

“We saw that particularly in boom years when increases in spending went largely into more staff and more pay for staff.”

While there had been improvements in some areas and in some specialties, in relation to “intractables” such as emergency department over-crowding and hospital waiting lists, the problems were the same or even worse when the budget was much higher. “The challenge is to ensure that additional spending benefits patients and patient services.”

Mr Varadkar said the Oireachtas should unite to put pressure on the pharmaceutical industry to come up with fair prices. "So often it is the case that Ireland is asked to pay more than other jurisdictions for the exact same medicines. I think we would do better for patients and the taxpayer if we all united to put pressure on industry and not on the HSE or the Government to overpay for certain medicines."

The Oireachtas committee on health and children approved a €680 million supplementary budget for the health service for this year.

Mr Varadkar said at the committee hearing that the HSE would start 2015 with a clean slate financially, although some voluntary hospitals would carry forward a deficit. He said there were “upside risks and downside risks” associated with the health budget for next year. On the plus side, “we could do better on drug savings or receive more income from health insurers”. However on the downside demand for services could increase while assessing the cost of dealing with negligence claims was unpredictable.

The Minister added that he believed he had succeeded in his objective of securing a “realistic” health budget for next year. However he would be “insisting that in return, those who hold budget responsibility must plan and deliver services within the resources available”.