Mr. George Kennedy:

There were several questions and I will do my best to go through them. The first question dealt with family support workers. Currently, we have a service level agreement in the west which covers counties Mayo, Roscommon and Leitrim. This leaves counties Galway, Sligo and Donegal out of the equation. We have three options. The best option is a service level agreement for the counties outside the current agreement. We would consider a grant agreement with the HSE for a defined period where we could have somebody working there. Currently, the woman who looks after the three counties I mentioned does her best to service the counties outside the agreement. The agreement only gives us the lady's basic salary. We have to come up with everything else ourselves, including the travel and subsistence allowance. Even if her subsistence was covered, it would be something. It is undesirable but it is a better alternative than for us to fund raise to have subsistence covered.

We have a grant agreement with the HSE for counties Cork and Kerry.