Pat Rabbitte today claimed the Government had no mandate for its plan to build private clinics on the grounds of public hospitals and that the move would intensify the drift towards "US-style for-profit medical care".
The Labour leader said the plan was "the act of a desperate minister, and a desperate Government, which had utterly failed to tackle the crisis in the health service".
But the Minister for Health Mary Harney this evening insisted that co-location projects would mean new beds, fastest, at public hospitals, available for all patients.
Speaking at a Progressive Democrat campaign rally in Dublin, Ms Harney said once again the Labour Party has allowed its ideology get in the way of practical results for patients.
Ms Harney said: "Private activity at public hospitals is often well in excess of the designated private bed ratio."
"The private bed ratio is typically 20 per cent, but private activity is can range from 28 per cent to nearly 40 per cent in some cases.
"The co-location project will free up all designated private beds, plus the public beds used for private patients," she said.
Earlier Mr Rabbitte warned that if Fianna Fáil and the PDs were returned to power and allowed go ahead with their plan for the building of super private clinics "it will worsen the two tier nature of the health service".
Speaking while canvassing in Galway, he claimed the plan was uncosted but likely to be extremely expensive, bad for patients. "It is a backdoor policy for which the Minister for Health Mary Harney had no mandate," he said.
Mr Rabbitte his party would never accept a health system where the quality and speed of care received is determined solely by ability to pay.
Outlining Labour's policy on health in Dublin today, the party's enterprise, trade and employment spokesman Ruairi Quinn insisted that the root of the problems with the health service was a lack of sufficient beds.
Mr Quinn said: "Bed capacity is both the main obstacle to solving the big issues like overcrowding, the spread of MRSA, and long stays on A&E trolleys, and the solution."
"We will build 2,300 public hospital beds because from insufficient cancer care to chaotic A&Es, we must have enough acute in-patient beds to meet demand."
He also pledged the Opposition would provide 1,500 step-down beds so that those occupying an acute hospital bed simply because there is nowhere else for them to go can be cared for in the community.
The party's health spokeswoman Liz McManus said the electorate were being offered two quite distinct approaches
She claimed: "The key component of the Government's health plan is the proposal to gift valuable sites and provide generous tax concessions to facilitate private developers to construct super-private clinics."
"The Alliance for Change, on the other hand, is committed to the provision of 2,300 additional public hospital beds and the provision of 1,500 step-down beds, including 600 in the Greater Dublin area," she said.