More than €70 million unspent by the Department of Health was returned to the Department of Finance at the end of last year, it has been confirmed.
The amount surrendered by the Department of Health, which never has sufficient resources to meet all the demands on it, was significantly more at the end of last year than in previous years.
At the end of 2004 the amount surrendered was €70.9 million whereas in 2003 the amount sent back to Finance by the Department of Health was €26.2 million, in 2002 the amount returned was €30.6 million, in 2001 it was €1.2 million and in the year 2000 the amount returned was €5.7 million.
The €70.9 million surplus for 2004 includes money earmarked for certain purposes but which went unspent, budget savings and money collected in health levy contributions in excess of the amount originally earmarked for the Department of Health by the Department of Finance.
A spokesman for the Department of Health said the amount of health levy it received in excess of the amount earmarked for it by Finance must be surrendered to the exchequer under public financial procedures.
The total amount it surrendered in this way last year was €60.7 million.
The rest of the money sent back was made up of budget savings of some €1.8 million and €8.3 million which had been earmarked for costs associated with the Hepatitis C and HIV compensation tribunal and payments to the State claims agency for the clinical indemnity scheme but which went unspent.
Details of the amounts returned to the Department of Finance over the last number of years have been outlined by the Minister for Health Mary Harney in a written reply to a Dáil question.
Labour's health spokeswoman Liz McManus said yesterday she was "a bit staggered" by the amount given back to the Department of Finance by the Department of Health last year.
"It seems a very sizeable amount particularly when you think of the facilities that are lying idle because they have not provided the money to open them. I think this kind of money should be allocated for this purpose," she said.
"There is no reason that that money should be given back to Finance if it could be spent wisely in health. The amount returned last year would cover the entire cost of the Tánaiste's A&E plan. It could even go towards providing more medical cards.
"I find it staggering that the Department of Health cannot reallocated that money when there is such a variety of need there. It doesn't make sense to have it going back into the maw of the Department of Finance," she added.
Fine Gael's health spokesman Dr Liam Twomey also said he believed surplus money accumulated in the Department of Health in any given year should not be handed over to the Department of Finance.
He said it should be held as a contingency fund for the health services so that when money ran short during the year cutbacks could be avoided.
The money might also have been used for extra beds or equipment in community facilities, he said.