Call for hospital car park charges to be abolished

Sinn Féin TD Paul Donnelly has said that hospital car parking charges need to be phased out.

The Dublin West TD said that a fully-funded plan was required, saying that patients and families should not be charged “simply because they need healthcare.”

Donnelly was speaking after figures were released by the party’s health spokesperson David Cullinane, which showed that hospital car parking income at James Connolly Memorial Hospital rose from €273,560 in 2021 to €2,468,136 in 2025 – a 118% increase. 

Statewide, income increased from €7.39 million in 2021 to €17.76 million in 2025.

Donnelly said, “hospital car parking charges are a charge on being sick and visiting families and friends in hospital; this is an issue that Sinn Féin in Dublin West has been highlighting for years.”

“No one chooses to be sick or to have a sick child in hospital. Yet patients and families in Dublin West are being asked to pay these charges again and again,” he said.

“People with disabilities, carers and families visiting loved ones in hospital are also being hit,” Donnelly noted.

“The amount being raised through hospital parking has increased dramatically. Hospitals should not have to depend on money collected from sick people and their families.”

He said that a fully-funded plan was needed to phase out the car park charges.

“The government should provide replacement funding as charges are phased out, while ensuring hospital parking remains available for patients and visitors,” he said.

Fellow Dublin West opposition TD and Green Party leader Roderic O’Gorman said earlier this year that cancer patients are disproportionately affected by parking charges.

O’Gorman said that he was working with the Irish Cancer Society to ease the financial burden on cancer patients and their families and was looking to achieve this in his role as chair of a cross-party group on cancer in the Oireachtas.

“Cancer patients are disproportionately affected by car parking fees, with 8 in 10 reporting it as an unavoidable cost of their treatment. Lowering or removing these parking charges entirely for cancer patients and their families would be a small but important step towards lifting a burden off those dealing with debilitating long-term conditions,” he said.

He said, “these charges are an extra burden on patients who are sick, who are vulnerable and who have no other choice but to park on the hospital campus.”

The Irish Cancer Society has campaigned to abolish parking charges for cancer patients for over a decade, and O’Gorman said it was high time for the change to take place.

He said, “I believe a more compassionate approach, working with patients, staff and hospital leadership, can lead to a positive outcome here.”