A junior health minister is denying she threatened to quit her job over cost-cutting.

It had been reported in recent weeks that Kathleen Lynch who has special responsibility for mental health services made the threat at a meeting with the Health Minister, Taoiseach and Tánaiste.

But in the Dáil this morning she declared it did not happen.

 The Junior Minister denied she had threatened to resign during questioning on mental health services from Fianna Fáil's Billy Kelleher.