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Funding is secured for recruitment of 3,554 additional posts in the HSE for 2025. We will deliver faster access to care. Our waiting list action plan 2025 was published last week with €420 million in funding allocated. We will continue to review capacity in emergency departments … time equivalents since 2020, more affordable health care through reductions in the drugs payment scheme to a threshold of €80, the removal of hospital inpatient charges, the extension of the eligibility for free GP cards for children under the age of eight and to all earning no more

have been on the waiting list for up to eight months. It simply is not good enough. Someone applying for a driving test today in Sligo would wait seven months to get one. Someone applying for one in Leitrim today would wait up to six months … need to recognise that we have an awful lot of work to do. People need their car to get to work or to hospital appointments and to get their children to school. The Government cuts transport in every other way. Every September, Deputies fight in this Chamber

diagnosed. That is six years of appointments and different examinations with consultants and GPs. All that type of stuff contributes to expanding waiting lists because people are on the journey to try to find out what is wrong with them in many cases. If extra resources are devoted … productive members of society, they can continue to work, they will not require care and the number of times they have to attend hospital can be reduced. I would like the Minister to look at that piece in its totality. I know it is in the programme

Galway and in Lee Road clinic. They are all operating and taking referrals. Women are receiving care through Galway and the National Maternity Hospital. There is more work to do on the structuring of those clinics. We now have clinical guidelines in relation to this. GPs are encouraged … important for me to put those facts on the record of the House. Women with endometriosis may be on other gynaecology waiting lists. That is also important. There was an increase of 108% in general gynaecology referrals over the past number of years. I hope in part that

school building projects to progress. Salesian Secondary School in Celbridge still has waiting lists. Maynooth Post Primary School still has waiting lists. There are people still waiting to get into Maynooth Community College. Families are finding this particularly difficult, and we need to really address what is happening … have this strategy in place in order that we can, in turn, make sure we have the skills required to develop the roads, hospitals and other the key elements of infrastructure that we need. While the focus should rightly be on national infrastructure, as it is in this

election campaign, which we talked about before, the question of access to health services, particularly to GPs, was a major factor. There are waiting lists for existing surgeries. The surgeries provide a good service but they cannot take on any more patients. The Minister of State will also … response and thank him for it. He said that even in spite of the delays and cost overruns, the national children’s hospital would be finished quicker than the new primary care centre in Gorey. I agreed with him. This Minister, in fairness to him, intervened directly, such

need to look at carefully. Another major infrastructural challenge is the absence of inpatient beds. The acute mental health facility in University Hospital Galway has 50 beds. The data highlights that the facility is consistently full, leading to my concern that it is difficult to get access … must often await assessment and the availability of interventions and therapies is limited. As was mentioned, 4,500 children are on the existing waiting list for CAMHS. It is likely that many of those patients were referred to CAMHS as a result concerns about ADHD and are seeking

hospital care. Since commencement of the multi-annual action plan approach, significant progress has been made in reducing the length of time hospital patients are waiting. The new regional structures within the HSE have been established with the six new health regions and 20 integrated healthcare areas. Health … three years, an additional €44 million, which is an increase of 32%, has been allocated to support CAMHS to increase core staffing, reduce waiting lists and expand CAMHS hubs to improve crisis cover for services. In budget 2026, funding has been allocated to develop a new CAMHS emergency

feature on the podium of Bord Bia quality awards, showing how well regarded they are in the industry and by the accommodation and hospitality sector. Cromane mussels and oysters are famous not just here at home but all over the world. It is the same … those who are assigned the task of passing judgment on these applications? Is there an unwillingness to grant more licences? This incredible waiting list is putting at risk businesses and livelihoods that are the lifeblood of our coastal communities. There must be a reason for the delay. Applicants

market, it causes problems. Whether that is for students, asylum seekers, people in nursing homes or people on local authority waiting lists, the answer from the Government always seems to be to outsource it again. Its idea is to build more units, not to focus on social … would be 12 years before they would be considered for a house, and another couple is waiting for a house for 16 years. A 67-year-old man who is in hospital with pneumonia is living in or returning to a house that is nearly

need it and where they need it. We will deliver faster access to care. Funding of €420 million has been allocated for the waiting list action plan this year. The new regional structures within the HSE have been established, with six new health regions and 20 integrated healthcare … whole-time equivalents since December 2019, more affordable healthcare through a reduction in the drugs payment scheme threshold to €80, the removal of hospital inpatient charges, the extension of the eligibility for free GP cards for all children under eight and to all earning no more than

funded posts during the remainder of 2025. We will deliver faster access to care. Funding of €420 million has been allocated for the waiting list action plan 2025. We will continue to review capacity in emergency departments. We will increase the number of public-only consultants in emergency … since the start of 2020, more affordable healthcare through reductions in the drugs payment scheme threshold to €80, removal of hospital inpatient charges, extension of the eligibility for free GP cards for all children under eight and to all earning no more than the median income, State-funded

could be said that the only election promise on which the Government has made good immediately was the wrongheaded VAT cut for hospitality and hairdressing, which is a narrowing of our tax base, with no evidence it will have any positive impact on businesses, workers or consumer prices … most impacted by the failure to act by this Government, including children who have additional needs, children with autism, who are on long waiting lists for services and places. There are 5,000 children without a home and many more children in poverty. There is an uncertain future

surgery waiting list increased month on month from 108 in December to 137 at the end of last month. I agree with the Minister; it is about the length of time people are waiting, not necessarily the number. Some 48 of those children have been waiting for more … than six months, a 33% increase since December. The previous Minister for Health promised that no more than 20 children would wait more than four months for spinal surgery by the end of 2024 as a result of new initiatives such as surgeries abroad. Surgeries abroad

feel like I know him. The reason I did not get to meet him was because he was either too sick or in hospital. However, over the years, I feel I have got to know him. If you go by Harvey's home, there is a lovely tree … very visual example. It captured the emotions of the nation. Harvey was let down so many times. He was removed from the critical waiting list without his parents' knowledge. Have his parents been given a reason at this stage? I raised this last November. Have they been given

under pressure. I also really welcome the €300,000 for a specialist crisis mental health nursing team in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital. Everyone from County Louth will know we have been asking for this for a long time. This is a real relief for many of those … coming years. This is not in the Minister of State’s immediate portfolio but I want to raise primary care and the psychology waiting list. I have spoken to the Minister of State on this regularly. Prevention is always cheaper and better than crisis care. There

waiting for longer than six months, never mind four months, for their life-changing surgery. Countless more children have been entirely removed from waiting lists because they have been left for so long that their condition has become inoperable. Precious children have lost not only their mobility … independent inquiry. Despite the fact that he refuses to accept it, the Tánaiste did sign off on the contract for the children's hospital. We learned today that the 16th completion date will come and go. Construction started on the hospital the Tánaiste signed off on ten years

million has been provided to the enhanced community care, ECC, programme. This suite of strategic reform initiatives seeks to reduce dependency on the hospital system by delivering increased levels of healthcare provision in the community setting, with service delivery reorientated towards healthcare general practice, primary care and community … local area, as articulated by the Deputy, in regard to waiting times and lack of availability of services. It also recognises that much work needs to be done to fill vacancies at local level and address waiting lists. To this end, a joint Department of Health

single biggest emergency that families and communities face in Ireland. It affects every aspect of our society, from families languishing on council housing lists for 16 years and more, never sure if the dreaded eviction notice is going to land, to teachers, nurses, doctors, gardaí and skilled workers … move abroad where they can afford mortgages and rents. They cannot do it here. All this is happening while the vulture funds hover, waiting to buy up entire estates. There is nothing acceptable about vulture funds bulk-buying at the expense of workers, families and struggling home buyers

said to the Minister last week, and he must agree with this, it is absolutely unacceptable that there is not a list of phone numbers that a public representative can ring. If you are dealing with any other State agency, there are senior people you can call … work with emails. The problem with that is it takes days to respond. Sometimes you need a response quickly and you cannot wait days. The Minister knows that as a long-standing public representative. This issue has to be sorted out. It is at the core

point that it is not sustainable for them to continue to provide care in the home. As I have outlined, there are significant waiting lists. I have been contacted by the parents of a woman - their youngest child - who is 32 years of age. She has Down … residential care, which is leaving families in unimaginable and unsustainable situations as they worry about what will happen to their adult children. Between hospital staffing costs, operation costs and, crucially, the lack of multi-annual funding, they are projecting a funding deficit for 2025. If the Minister

next Wednesday's planned action. The ball is firmly in the Government's court. The Minister will not have visited picket lines at hospitals, council yards, schools, primary care centres and Intreo offices yesterday but my Labour colleagues and I did. Let me tell the Minister what … failed miserably. They also know that in last week's budget nothing was done to shift the dial on class sizes or health waiting lists. They know too that this is a fight for every worker and for everyone's living standards. As one striker rightly asked

Sláintecare and reverse the increasing privatisation of health and social care. At any one time, there are approximately 700 people in hospitals throughout the country waiting to be discharged, but who are unable to return home as there is no home care support available … work involved telling so many people who had been referred to the Peter Bradley Foundation that they were being put on a waiting list for residential services that were not available because there was a limited spread of services throughout the country, and it remains

being inserted inside children; it is not just about the death of Harvey Morrison Sherratt after having previously been wrongly taken off a waiting list; and it is not just about the outpouring of anger we saw on the streets at the end of the summer around … know, adult care also needs to be looked at. I also want to ask about Cappagh hospital being fully included. I previously referenced the email from the clinical director at Cappagh hospital about ending the multidisciplinary teams, MDTs, because of osteotomies not happening. I got a new parliamentary

exclusion. This causes a fundamental and urgent question. What is the pathway for access to Blackrock Clinic, Morgan Stanley and Great Ormond Street Hospital? Who decides which children will be selected? It feels like my lovely son was simply overlooked, forgotten and that is something no parent should … these parents this evening that will satisfy them in the context of dates and times and the reduction of the waiting list. However, I encourage her to read her emails. These emails have been sent to her by the parents. I urge her to respond, engage and prevent