Micheál Martin

The Deputy has offered no solution. She has offered rhetoric, and that is all.

The bottom line is this. We will do everything we simply can to deal with the existing waiting lists and so forth. There has been a significant increase in the numbers of assessments that have actually taken place - a 30% increase on 2023 - but that in itself will not deal with the current situation. We have to have a multifaceted response. We need more therapists in third level colleges.

We will be providing more private funding to procure assessments. All of that, however, will not, in my view, redirect the work of therapists most appropriately, which is to provide services to children.

I am making a point. Under the current system, the status quo is simply not tenable. The Deputy must know that deep down, so there has to be change in respect of that.

In my view, we have to explore every avenue we can to increase the number of therapists and to recruit more therapists. The money is there in many instances-----

-----and the HSE has not been able to recruit 100% of its CDNT teams.

There will be.

One of the reasons this Government quickly established the need for a therapy-in-school service, which we have now commenced and taken the decision to do, was the inadequacy of the response within the health service itself. Many CDNT teams are experiencing challenges in recruiting and retaining therapists, as well as wider general issues. The issue is actually not one of resources; it is one of ca…

The Deputy mentioned special education. Special class enrolment has doubled in five years. We have gone from about 9,000 to 19,000. What is that saying? It is revealing the exponential growth in the number of children requiring special needs provision and services and resources have expanded accordingly, in terms of the number of classes, SNAs and special teachers and funding for extra classrooms …

Sorry, I have already organised that. There has been engagement and we will meet.

I have met Cara before and Deputies-----

From day one, the Government has identified the entire area of disability and special needs as a key priority, along with housing and, as I said earlier, child poverty. That will be reflected in the forthcoming budget and has already been reflected in Government initiatives. Decisions have been taken at recent meetings of the Cabinet subcommittee in respect of this. Going back, when the party the …

-----given the finite number of therapists we have. We can pass all the motions we like but we have to deal in a very pragmatic, solution-based approach right now. We have to deal with this in a multifaceted way but, right now, we need to make sure that the therapists we have are focused on providing services to children as quickly as we possibly can, consistent with the needs of those children. …

Early intervention is the key. I could not agree more. We need to expand early childcare services for children with additional needs, particularly early childhood education provision for those children. We are doing that and will continue to expand services there. The HSE is not in a position to fulfil the law right now. The Deputy knows that and I know that. We have to respond to enable us to get…

I thank the Deputy very much for raising the issue of the crucial importance of primary care provision. When I was Minister for Health and Children in 2001, we made primary care the cornerstone of the then health strategy, Quality and Fairness. It took some time. In the modern area, we have progressed fairly significantly in terms of the provision of primary care centres. There are now about 179 o…

-----and the HSE in respect of the capital requirements for that. I hear the Deputy loud and clear. This is an important centre of population that requires a primary care centre.

I said 179.

I said there are 179 primary care centres now in place. Of those, 50 have opened since 2020. I take the Deputy's point that we still need more GPs. The outgoing Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly, had approved, with the outgoing Minister for higher education, now Tánaiste, additional places in all third level colleges in respect of medicine and also, in terms of nursing and so on, in Northern I…

What is happening in Gaza is absolutely appalling. I noted a quote earlier from a Dr. Potokar in Gaza who said that "if Cambodia was the killing fields, then Gaza now is the slaughterhouse." What is happening to innocent civilians in Gaza is beyond any moral compass, particularly the children who are being slaughtered and the children who are starving. It needs to come to an end. The weaponisatio…

I find it morally repulsive as well.

As the Deputy knows, at UN level we have been doing quite a lot working with other like-minded countries, particularly co-sponsoring the motion that led to the ICJ's advisory opinion in respect of the illegal occupation of Palestinian territories. We intend to continue to work with like-minded states. There is a conference coming up in June in New York, organised by a number of countries - France,…

The Deputy said he supported the Housing Commission's report, and the Housing Commission report recommended changes to the rent pressure zones. I do not know why he is condemning the Government for even considering the recommendation of the Housing Commission in respect of that issue.

Regarding real investment in dwellings, the Irish economy registered the fourth largest increase across the 27 EU countries between 2020 and 2024. The House may be interested to know that a recent Economic and Social Research Institute, ESRI, publication in 2024 comparing housing supply across Ireland, Northern Ireland, England, Scotland and Wales found that Ireland and Northern Ireland had the hi…

Renters are not being ignored by this Government. That is just a false statement. Over the last number of years, we have brought in a series of protections, regulatory and otherwise, to protect tenants and give greater security. We have also continued to keep protecting renters as a high priority of Government. I cannot commit to emergency legislation on the blind. If the Deputy sends me the detai…

We keep bandying words about the place, but the expansion of health services in recent years has been exponential. We need to get a sense of perspective in how we describe things. I am not saying there is not challenges but the bottom line is €25 billion is being spent on our health services. The HSE has significant resources. I was involved in setting up the PHECC and so on 20-odd years ago.