Joan Freeman (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am the Chair of the Joint Oireachtas Committee of the Future of Mental Health Care. It is the first mental health committee in the history of the State and it is probably the first committee in Europe on mental health. I thank the Taoiseach for agreeing to forming it. We have fallen into a funny situation as a committee. We have identified some of the really serious issues concerning the HSE, in particular over the mental health services. The HSE, for example, is incapable and unable to account for how money is spent in CAMHS. Its excuse is that it does not have the software, which I find extraordinary. The other issue is that it discusses at length the impossibility of recruiting and retaining clinical staff, yet it has been giving us misinformation on those issues. We have discovered how very important this committee is and I ask the Taoiseach to consider making it a permanent one.