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“FOR SOME REASON, naively, I thought this had all been resolved. That’s when I realised nothing had changed.”
Thelma Carthy’s mother, Ena, had two different cancer diagnoses, seven years apart. Sadly, Ena died in September.
In the last months of her mother’s life, Carthy estimates she was paying €200 a month in parking fees at the Mater University Hospital where parking costs up to €15 a day.
“When things are tough and your back’s to the wall with a sick parent or a sick child the last thing you’re thinking about is parking.”
Between May and September she reckons she paid over €1,000 on parking alone. Carthy is not an outlier. An Irish Cancer Society survey in 2021 found that families of children with cancer could pay an average of over €200 per month on parking.
For years, people with long-term conditions and their families have been promised that the government was going to introduce measures to combat high fees in hospital car parks.
There is broad agreement from patient advocate groups, political parties, the government and the HSE that something should be done. A commitment to address hospital parking costs was included in the 2020 Programme for Government.
This would cost hospitals at least €4.75m per year to offset reductions in parking income, according to a 2018 HSE review.
Yet despite promises from the government going back to 2018, these measures have not materialised.
At Noteworthy, our PARKING PRESSURE investigation examined key documents obtained through Freedom of Information (FOI) requests, analysed accounts and spoke to experts to find out if there has been any progress on these promises and the impact high costs are having on families around Ireland.
“It’s definitely not been prioritised,” said Amy Nolan, Head of Children, Adolescents and Young Adults at the Irish Cancer Society. “I think it would be an easy win for the government to alleviate some of the financial burden on families.”
Seven years ago, Carthy said, she took hospital car parking fees as just another part of the expense that comes with a serious diagnosis requiring long-term treatment. But then she discovered, upon taking her mother for treatment in another hospital, that it offered free parking to regular patients.
I remember thinking: ‘Well if one hospital can do it, albeit a smaller set up, then why can’t another?’
She wasn’t alone in questioning the system. The Irish Cancer Society began campaigning on this issue in 2016, the same year it produced its ‘Park the Charges’ report.
Parking fees are just one of the numerous additional costs that families are suddenly faced with when a child is diagnosed with cancer, explained Nolan.
The report highlighted an additional issue – even when concessions do exist for patients, they’re often not well-publicised, leading to people paying for parking unnecessarily. There is no centralised database of charges or concessions and hospitals do not offer refunds to those who needn’t have paid, according to Nolan.
There are statutory, voluntary and private hospitals in Ireland and all arrange parking differently.
Through FOI requests to the HSE, Noteworthy gathered data on the 31 statutory hospitals which provide parking to the public, and seven of Ireland’s biggest voluntary hospitals: St. Vincent’s; St. James’s; Tallaght; Beaumont; the Coombe; the Rotunda and the Mater.
We found that only 8 statutory hospitals have free parking. The 23 fee-paying hospitals made €5.1 million in 2021 and €5.2 million in 2020 – down from €12 million in 2019, before the pandemic.
The voluntary hospitals made €5.3 million in 2021 and €5.7 in 2020 – €8.4 million was made in 2019.
Following the Irish Cancer Society report, the then-Minister for Health Simon Harris asked the HSE to carry out a national review of hospital car parking charges in March 2018 “with the aim of establishing clear national guidelines on this area for the first time”.
The HSE finished its review in November 2018 and though some of its findings were reported by media at the time, it has never been officially published.
This review was refused by the Department of Health (DOH) through FOI. The reasons given included that its “premature release could contaminate the decision-making process”.
However, the HSE provided it to Noteworthy through FOI and we have made it available here.
The review was based on data from 47 hospitals in Ireland. It endorsed the idea that changes to the current system were necessary and added that parking charges mostly affects those with chronic conditions, who are least able to afford it, and impose not only financial but also non-monetary costs in terms of time and stress.
The report recommended some specific measures that could be introduced. The executive summary stated that “the best way forward was to provide overarching principles on the setting of fee structures in each hospital while instructing each hospital to introduce a set maximum daily rate, together with the introduction of multi-entry/weekly tickets in every site”.
It recommended that hospitals cap the maximum daily rate for parking at €10 and concessions for regular patients be introduced. At the time it was produced, at least 10 hospitals charged more than this.
The report concluded that, based on its recommendations, 17 hospitals – 10 of which are privately run – would need to change their fees and therefore “funding of approximately €4.75m would be required to offset the reduction in income as a result of these changes”.
The report briefly addressed concerns over the high cost of parking for hospital staff.
As part of our FOI requests, we also obtained complaints addressed to Health Minister Stephen Donnelly and the Department of Health from hospital staff – student nurses in particular.
The complaints stated that parking charges were too high, especially when working shifts during hours when public transport is not available. However, this issue has not been explicitly addressed by the government in any of its commitments.
The HSE submitted its review to the government in December 2018.
Eight months later, in August 2019, it sent the Department of Health an implementation plan. A spokesperson told Noteworthy that “the HSE continues to engage with the Department in relation to the Programme for Government commitments on car parking charges and concessions”.
In 2020, the government included a commitment to work on parking charges in the Programme for Government.
In the ‘Fairer and Affordable Care’ section it promised to “introduce a cap on the maximum daily charge for car parking for patients and visitors at all public hospitals, where possible”, and “introduce flexible passes in all public hospitals for patients and their families”.
The Department did not respond when we asked what progress has been made towards fulfilling the commitment.
Noteworthy obtained 36 records from the DOH through FOI when we requested “correspondence, memos, briefing notes and reports” in relation to hospital parking charges.
All were complaints and queries from politicians, healthcare workers, citizens and journalists, with no evidence of progress or updates on this issue from the DOH.
When we asked the HSE for a copy of the implementation plan and an update on the progress, a HSE spokesperson said:
The Implementation Plan was in draft format in 2019 and has been superseded by the passage of time.
“Further work is required in relation to the cost of providing some form of flexible passes/concessionary parking and the HSE continues to engage with the Department in relation to the Programme for Government commitments on car parking charges and concessions.”
Minister Donnelly did not respond to a request for comment but a spokesperson for the Department said that the government and hospitals appreciate the financial challenges faced by patients, especially regular ones.
They added: “Consideration is being given to how best to ensure this commitment is addressed building on the HSE’s Review and taking account of existing arrangements already in place”.
Consequently, some hospitals have introduced a maximum daily fixed parking charge and reduced rate parking for long-term patients and visitors for whom the payment of the full rate would cause hardship.
The DOH spokesperson said that “in particular, the HSE has confirmed that all hospitals that charge for parking already have a maximum daily rate”.
However, the HSE review in 2018 found that the maximum rate in at least 10 hospitals exceeded its recommended €10 cap.
Aontu TD Peadar Tóibín became frustrated with what he saw as government inaction and introduced the Hospital Parking Bill 2021 in April that year.
“The government had committed to it… yet there was nothing happening on it,” he told Noteworthy. “We weren’t going to wait for the government.”
His Bill seeks to make outpatient hospital parking free of charge for the first three hours. It was brought to the second stage in the Dáil in February 2022 and the government did not oppose it.
A spokesperson for the DOH said that “the Government acknowledged the spirit and intent of this Bill, while noting some limitations”.
Tóibín said that the current situation is unfair – people with cancer, who face increased costs and decreased income, are being squeezed both ways. “The current system means that we’re paying for health services through the taxation of patients. We should be paying through the taxation of income and wealth.”
When Noteworthy told Tóibín about the HSE’s estimate of €4.75 million to offset the reduction in parking income, he was surprised at how small an amount it was: “So much pressure being put on cancer patients for that?”
In August 2021, Thelma Carthy’s mother was diagnosed with cancer a second time. By then, the need for parking reform had become a settled question since she’d last accompanied her to the Mater. She’d heard in the news that the government was going to do something about car parking fees for people like them.
“When we met with the new team, I said: ‘So, do you give me the car parking pass?’ They looked at me and laughed like I had 15 heads,” she told Noteworthy. “That’s when I realised nothing had changed. Nothing.”
When this reaction was put to the Mater University Hospital, a spokesperson told Noteworthy that the hospital’s “priority is to be at the frontier of compassion, concern and clinical care” for all its patients, but did not comment on concessions for car parking.
They did tell Noteworthy that the hospital supports other initiatives: “We are part of the Irish Cancer Society’s ‘Care to Drive’ scheme, where cancer patients can avail of free transport to and from their treatment.
We offer four parking spaces free of charge for relatives of patients nearing end of life, in order to ease the burden for families at a very difficult time in their lives.
Carthy also wrote to the operator of the Mater’s car park and inquired about concessions but was told there were none available. That is how she ended up spending in excess of €50 a week in the last months of her mother’s life.
She was so angry that she wrote to her local Sinn Féin TD Dessie Ellis who sent a query on her behalf to Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly in May 2022.
His office replied: “Minister Donnelly is aware that hospitals that charge parking fees are very cognisant of the financial implications of parking costs for patients and their families, particularly for those with long-term illnesses… The issue has been under active consideration in recent years.”
The Irish Cancer Society released another report in August 2022 – The Hidden Costs of Hospital Car Parking for Families.
It calls parking charges one of the most unjustifiable expenses that families face: “It is not the first expense that comes to mind, but it quickly takes a toll on families who are already struggling to make ends meet.”
Most patient groups are impacted by hospital parking charges. Another, the Irish Kidney Association, told Noteworthy that “being on hospital-based dialysis comes with financial costs”.
The HSE provides transport to people receiving dialysis and since Covid, when infection risk made shared hospital transport inadvisable, it has given those who want to manage their own transport a mileage allowance. But it is a national flat rate and does not take parking costs into account.
A spokesperson for the Irish Kidney Association said: “If the allowance paid does not reflect the change in the cost of [fuel] and if the patient has to take hospital parking charges into account, it can be difficult for a patient to maintain their travel independence and provide a potentially cheaper option for the HSE.”
The HSE review made clear that for free or capped parking to be introduced, the income shortfall and other issues would need to be addressed.
Free hospital parking “can cause problems with abuse of car parks by non-hospital users”, the review noted – an issue that Aontu’s Tóibín also remarked upon: “They should be only for people who need it.”
On the question of income, Amy Nolan of the Irish Cancer Society said that “the hospitals would suffer if they weren’t getting car parking funds”, and added that “we’d hope the government would make up that shortfall”.
In response to queries by Noteworthy about where parking income goes, a spokesperson for the HSE said that, for the statutory hospitals, “the income generated from these car parking fees cover the cost of providing these services”.
This includes “the initial capital cost of purchasing or renting parking areas, the cost of developing extra parking spaces, the need to provide and upgrade security systems, provide staffing and general maintenance of these car parks”.
For example, the car park located at the Mater Hospital is owned by a subsidiary company, Eccles Street Parking Limited, although the contract to run the car park belongs to Euro Park.
Mater Misericordiae & Children’s University Hospital Limited (MMCUH), is the parent company of the Mater University Hospital and its subsidiaries, Eccles Street Car Park Limited and the National Orthopaedic Hospital.
According to its financial statements, Eccles Street Car Park uses the income from parking to repay the loan taken out to build it – a loan it had to take out because of government guidelines that say that State funds should not be expended on car parks at acute hospitals.
When Noteworthy asked the Mater University Hospital about the car park income, a spokesperson said that: “The Mater Hospital does not operate or receive any payment from the car park at the hospital.”
The secretary of MMCUH told us that the company has “not received funds from Eccles Street Car Park” and added: “MMCUH understands that income received by Eccles Street Car Park continues to service its loan.”
Of the other voluntary hospitals for which Noteworthy has compiled income, the Rotunda Hospital told us that it used the income “to support and fund hospital services”.
A spokesperson for the Coombe said that it “goes to fund repairs and maintenance of the car park system as well as maintenance of the car park and surrounds”.
Similarly, a St James’s Hospital spokesperson said that “income from car parking fees is one of the numerous ancillary income streams that the hospital utilises to provide funding for patient services. Concession parking is currently available to frequent visitors.”
Beaumont Hospital told us that it “does not operate its own car park but leases its operation to a Third Party, QPark, for which the hospital earns an annual rent. All income arising is directed to the provision of services for patients.”
Tallaght University Hospitals told Noteworthy that “the money is part of the Hospitals revenue budget which goes to providing front line services to our patients”.
Some hospitals, like Tallaght University, contract the management of its parking to a private company. In Tallaght’s case, a portion of the income also goes to pay this private contractor.
Noteworthy did not get a response to our request for comment from St Vincent’s University Hospital.
In the absence of government action, charities such as the Irish Cancer Society have stepped in. It gives money to families to cover some of the costs of cancer, such as hospital parking. It also organises a volunteer drive service to bring patients to their appointments.
While the driver service helps, it’s not a solution for everyone. Like Ena, Thelma Carthy’s mother, people may not want to interact with a stranger when they are extremely sick.
“I know it’s not going to be an overnight thing,” said Carthy, but “I just hope, maybe in a year or so, that families don’t have to go through this crap, because it’s a crap enough time.”
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By Alice Chambers of Noteworthy
Our PARKING PRESSURE investigation was proposed by readers of Noteworthy, the crowdfunded investigative journalism platform from The Journal. It was funded almost in its entirety by the Noteworthy general investigative fund which you can support here.
Please support our work by submitting an idea, helping to fund a project or setting up a monthly contribution to our investigative fund HERE>>
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This jump of €3000 over a weekend is a disgusting way to treat citizens. I would be surprised if any of those arrested for dealing drugs in North Dublin recently will see such fines. Normal Joe Soaps make easy targets I suppose.
Remember that when voting again
Yes, remember what party created the disastrous situation where taxes like this had to be introduced.
They are all as shyte as each other. None of them deserve a vote.
Anyone who needs a tax clearance cert to work will be in trouble !! Lots of self employed will be forced to stop work.
These taxs are done so many have no option but to pay if they want to carry on working.
they are complete gangsters the way they are operating. What commercial company could behave this way without being dragged through the courts.
This is insane, there was nothing in the media and no notification about this until this year! How can we possibly have known we were supposed to be paying this all along! What a scam!
You must have been hiding down some hole over the last 3 years or longer not to have known about this.
This is not only a charge on a second home it’s a charge on a non primary principal residence… I own an apartment and it’s my only property but because I was traveling and not staying in the house full time I was told I was liable for the 200 euro fee. I only found out about it when I went to sell the apartment.
Can you please change the opening paragraph of this article to “those who own a property and do not live in it”. The whole “those who own a second property” thing is wrong and what caused the problem in the first place! It’s not about ‘second property’ ownership, just if you own a place and don’t live in it. Evil tax to, hitting right when people were really stuck for money (ie 2009)
Plain English award right there….. its had every moniker starting off with a “holiday home” tax to make sound like a rich person tax. Grubby little tax
Local Property Tax …. EVIL TAX …. spot on Frances. No civilised society should tax Family Homes. Charges for competitively supplied and consumed services … no problem.
Next Time Bring Your Brains To The Polling Booths and Repeal This Odious EVIL Tax Law.
The only way people knew of this tax was through the media as no notifications were sent out originally. Too bad if you happened to emigrate but then to be notified after 5 years that you owe 4000 euro with the possibility of a massive penalty increase if you did not pay up. Why were people not notified from the beginning and why wait 5 years? Something terribly fishy about the whole affair.
Probably the intent was to eventually shake down many emigrants for significant sums of cash since they’re not longer in this country paying income tax & USC to the gansters in Leinster house like the rest of us…
Loan sharks at least have the decency of waiting til you approach them before they hit you with extortionate rates.
These guys don’t inform you about your debt until the last minute and arbitrarily set crazy penalties when they know you’ve no hope of paying.
They have had five years!
The punitive terms involved would embarrass Tony Soprano. There is no reason or cost incurred to justify this. I’m not affected so didn’t follow it closely but I was surprised to hear those who (sometimes with no choice) rented out their home are liable. For the usual suspects nobody is debating whether the money is owed or even that there should be some interest allowed it’s the scale of it that is genuinely shocking.
It occurs to me that there is a fundamental issue here of whether this sort of penalty is proportionate to the debt owed and whether the government can legislate to impose such severe penalty without the citizen having access to and the protection of the judicial system. I should think that this sort of behaviour is both unconstitutional and a breach of ECHR. Where a government legislates for a penalty to be paid, in this case for non payment of a levy, then the penalty must be proportionate and where it is as severe as in this legislation, then there must be afforded to the citizen an opportunity to have his /her case appealed or pleaded before a properly constituted court of law to determine whether the debt is actually due and the ability to pay. This is not a small meaningless parking fine but in many cases a financial penalty that can have serious consequences for personal lives and property rights. Why doesn’t someone affected by this complain to the ECHR? A competent constitional or human rights lawyer should be able to tear strips off this government for this sort of legislation against its citizens.
Outrageous. Didn’t request for the money to be paid at all. Then out of the blue an extortionate bill arrives, how can this be even legal?
Watch the suaside rate jump up in the next few months as the vunerable people are shocked beyond what they can bare
Are you suggesting people that can afford a second house should actually be considered ‘vulnerable’?
PLEASE read the details before making dumb comments. You do NOT have to OWN a second property to be hit by this unfair and outrageously applied tax
Jesus that’s some over reaction even for this hour of the morning.
Anyone who owes this knows they do and chose not to pay. That or they’re just too dumb to be left run their own affairs.
Why didn’t the wright to people 5 years ago ? If u got caught speeding didn’t get your fine in the post you would be happy to get notice 5 years later you owe €1000s and going to jail
This was brought in at the budget announcement stage. It’s a self-assessed tax, not illegal. Self employed people do self assessed tax returns in November each year. How people can say they didn’t know this is beyond me because it was all over the news. People knew exactly how much extra they got on budget day pre 2008 but since then they conveniently forget things like this.
Red thumb me all you want because I don’t care, I do know that many people ignored this in the hope it would go away. There are quite a few exemptions too, read the literature on the website, it’s all there in black and white. I wish some of the crew that rang liveline about this would have done this before calling in because they may well find out they are exempt. Why do I say this? Because I sorted this out for someone about 6 weeks ago. Councils have been writing out to people since around April, so the bollocks going around about getting 1 weeks notice is the usual anecdotal shite that gets reported ad-nauseum or conveniently forgotten to continually push an anti-establishment agenda.
The NPPR wouldn’t go away if ignored.
Same for water charges, property tax etc.
Live with that.
If there are genuine cases where people cannot pay then they will be easily able to prove this to the Local Authority who will then enter a payment plan for the amount due on the date the plan is put in place. The amount owed cannot vary over the period unless its part of the contractual agreement. Which is what a person will be doing. Contract = offer and consideration and agreement on that date.
Its simple but not much of that gets reported.
/ends
As Dennis owns the majority of the media he is not going to rock the boat as far as paying this tax, with the water charges coming on stream shortly he and his media will be keeping a tight lip.
The charge stays with the property for 12 years. If a person does not intend to sell in that period, why pay?
It’s extortion worse than Loan Shark scale.
I was in uk came back late 2010. Ive always paid all my taxes etc and always will. First i heard of genuinly was last week. Loan sharks. I feel violated
If your second property is within 2 KM of your home and you are not receiving rent from the property, you do not owe anything. A member of KCC told me this yesterday. Hope this helps someone
If you own a second property, could you be considered ‘hard-up’ ?
Larry lad do some research before you comment you don’t need to have two houses to get hit with this. If you have 1 house and not living in it for what ever reason you will have to pay up. Ps alot of people left Ireland for work and rented out there houses are being hit
Depends if you own without a mortgage or not. A 1500 a month mortgage on a property paying 1100 taxable income could make you hard up fairly quickly.
In the olden days I would have said no,Larry .As for today ,yes .
See where the confusion comes from , own a house, loose job , nearest job 100 miles away, rent a flat beside job because of negative equity….boom! €7K please , meanwhile council worker neighbour having a good laugh
Pete, I suspect the fact that there was never any official notifications sent to people in respect of this charge and only mentioned in the national media was a deliberate ploy. The gangsters in Leinster house knew this was an excellent method of eventually extracting a windfall amount from those who had left the country after losing jobs due to the previous inept FFailure gov.
It’s not exactly solely about ownership. It’s about where you live. If you own a house but don’t live in it because say you are working on the other side of the country (regardless of paying or receiving rent) then you are liable because it is not your principal private residence. The clue is in the title, which it isn’t called the second home tax or the holiday home tax etc.
Did you get an official notice of everything given or taken away during a budget speech? No, you didn’t, but people are using this shite to have a go at government now. They loved listening to newstalk with George Hook and then ringing in to find out exactly how much extra they got in that particular budget buy using “official notification” as a way of an “out” now.
If you are going to be charged for something you would usually expect to be notified , if you are going to be robbed the element of surprise usually helps the thief or thieves get away with it
@TomTraubert: the difference is the items in the Budget where you get no personal notice of: say, cigarettes/alcohol etc, you have the choice to not buy them. If they increase/decrease income tax where you have no choice, you DO get notified. NPPR has done neither. It isn’t even that – it’s the rate of penalty that’s the issue. A street corner loan-shark would be more upfront. And charge you less.
@Peter Foley do some reading before *you* comment.
I didn’t say anything about paying this tax on any number of homes, I am well aware of the tax and how it is being applied.
I merely asked a question.
And finally, please don’t refer to me as ‘lad’, you may not realise how patronising it is, unless that was your intention.
“You still have to pay the Local Property Tax charge on all properties in 2013 and 2014.”
Not true …. those who live in Local Authority Homes are exempt from paying the Local Property Tax.
Also those who have land property including farm land property do not have to pay the Local Property Tax.
No civilised society should tax family homes. Political Parties again passing Pro-Lobby laws not Pro-Citizen.
Next Time Bring Your Brains To The Polling Booths and Repeal this Odious Tax Law.
Property taxes are common in most civilized societies
Where have all the can”t pay won’t pay people gone?
Nothing got to do with NPPR tax, are you getting confused with the family home tax?
Are you getting confused with the democratically supported LPT
LPT/family home tax? Care to explain the difference?
I do remember FG in their manifesto stating they would not introduce a recurring charge on the family home, when did Labour achieve a majority?
Latest CSO statistics THE AVERAGE WEEKLY wage in the public sector is €918.86, almost €300 higher than the average private sector worker. Disgusting that these people are demanding exorbitant penalties to sustain their own position. Dont forget to Bring Your Brains to the Polling Booths next time.
I think a lot of people commenting are not thinking about the variety of circumstances someone liable for this could be in. It is not a “second home” tax it’s a non principal residence tax. If you owned a house and left Ireland in search of work leaving a house behind which you were unable to sell you are now liable for this. How could we not know about it? We left Ireland looking for work, the only way people were notified was by media which people living abroad have no access to. Also, due to living abroad it’s entirely realistic that people got less than a weeks notice before the bill almost doubled. No logical person can think this is fair.
Did a politician involved in this tax, buy his second house abroad,and now he does not have to pay this tax.
9000 signatures to scrap the Odious EVIL Irish Local Property Tax Law. http://www.localpropertytaxpetition.net
9000 signatures to reform the Odious Regressive Daft Irish Car Tax Law. http://www.cartaxpetition.net
Second homes should be taxed out of existence. This is what created the property bubble in the first place. Too many people with more than 1 property and too many with no home.
So no rental sector.
Maybe no one should allow a kid leave home till they buy a property?
This tax is / was also payable on a property being dealt with under deceased person’s Will, if the house is not the principal private residence of the Executor. Anyone dealing with a house as an Executor over the last few years who hasn’t paid the tax or had legal advice should check this out ASAP.
I hope there will be some follow up regarding the punitive fines that are similar to extortion. The tax needs to be challenged as it is a fiasco from beginning to end. Politicians and the legal profession have gone to ground. Luckily there are a few who will take legal action.
(1) The rate of penalties should comply with the principle of proportionality. This requires that both the tax as a whole, and the penalty imposed , comply with the principle of proportionality.
(2) The taxing process as a whole is flawed because there is an excessive penalty. Moreover, taking into account the proper lack of notification to the house owner regarding the liability the penalty is not a proportionate response to the gravity of the default which it seeks to penalise; and
(3) In the absence of any power to mitigate or otherwise reduce a disproportionate surcharge, the only possible course of action open to set aside the penalties
(4) The NPPR TAX is like an extra tax levied upon tax or an enforced wealth tax by another means ! Extortion
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