James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for their attendance; it is brave of them to turn up here today. I am from Wexford, and desperate parents ring me on a regular basis. One of the most horrendous things CAMHS in Wexford has to do is the triaging of desperate children. Children desperately need to be seen, and staff have to make a decision as to which are the worst cases when they all need to be seen. I have been told that a child is 30th on a list, then 12th and then they slip out further on the list because a worse case has appeared. However, every child on the list is in a very desperate situation. I can only imagine the mental health impacts on staff; it must be horrendous. If the witnesses get an opportunity perhaps they would address the impact working in such a service has on them.

Mr. Walsh mentioned that he had to travel to Cork, some 200 km away, to get an inpatient bed. I deal with many parents who are left in an invidious position whereby their children are left in the adult unit in Waterford, which I have visited and which is an extremely grim place which is not fit for purpose for adults, never mind children. Children are either left there or have to travel to Cork, Galway or Dublin. Perhaps the witnesses could discuss their experiences of the impact of that on parents and children.

In terms of retention of staff, we have heard about the issues of pay, but many nurses have told me that the conditions of work are horrendous and that no pay would convince them to stay on. I am talking about trying to triage in desperate situations, or not getting enough time to liaise with patients properly because there are other patients right behind who desperately need to be seen. Can the witnesses talk about the impact of that?

I recently spoke to an associate professor from America who was considering moving to Ireland. He does not work in the mental health sphere. He is the kind of person we should be begging to come to Ireland. He was shocked at the hoops his family was being made to jump through to actually take up a position. Furthermore, in America he had a massive support team, including secretaries, in addition to the actual health care team. He realised that if he got a position in Ireland he would be spending his first two years trying to put a team together, without proper supports, instead of actually seeing patients.

That seems to be one of the key issues. In terms of mental healthcare, we are almost in a death spiral now. One cannot get people to take the jobs because the conditions are so bad and the conditions will not improve unless one makes it better for people to take up those jobs. I suppose I am highlighting some of the issues. If anybody wants to know why we have statistically the fourth highest spend per capitaon healthcare and yet probably the worst healthcare system in the western world, it is the dysfunctionality. One need only listen to the evidence given here today to realise how dysfunctional our healthcare system is. That is why we are spending so much money and yet we are getting such bad outcomes, in particular, in terms of waiting times.