The Minister for Health and Children, Mr Martin, insisted last night resources were in place to prevent 11 elderly patients from being evicted from their nursing home in Cork.

He was replying to an adjournment motion in the Dail moved by Mr Bernard Allen (Fine Gael) which said the 11 were being evicted because of the Minister's failure to sanction allocations to health boards under an enhanced subvention scheme for nursing homes.

"There was no need for these letters of discharge to be issued and they should not have been, in my view," the Minister told the House.

Last week an elderly man faced eviction from another nursing home in Cork, Mr Allen said, while at the same time "families throughout the country are accumulating massive debts with private nursing homes".

The Minister said he was concerned by the threat by some nursing home owners to discharge patients. The Nursing Home (Subvention) Regulations provided for a minimum 14-day notice in the event of a person being discharged from a nursing home: "The purpose of this minimum period of notice is to facilitate the exploration of all avenues prior to the discharge of a person from a private nursing home and to ensure that alternative arrangements can be made."

He was disappointed to learn that in this instance all such avenues were not explored. "I was not informed - only by the public media,["] the Minister insisted.

He was advised by the Southern Health Board that a meeting between its officials and representatives of the nursing home would take place tomorrow. His Department was also monitoring the situation.

Overall, an additional 13 million pounds had been allocated to the SHB for 2001 - for services to the elderly: "I don't accept resources don't exist to prevent the discharge of those elderly people next week."