Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Where is it being spent in the community? By community I mean the people of east Galway, but it is replicated across the country. For example, there was a community house with six patients in Athleague. On the weekend of Storm Ophelia the patients were moved to Castlerea and elsewhere and the house has closed since then. The Rosalie unit is in the process of closing down. In Portumna the day hospital is considering changing its structure at present whereby a patient will get a visitation for half an hour once a week. That is why I want to know how the money is being spent in the community. It appears to me that we are doing a great deal of box ticking here, but where is the money going back into the community? That is what matters on the ground. It is not being felt. It is felt that the complete restructuring taking place at present is the weeding out of services in areas. I would like to have a breakdown of how money is being spent in the community.

While we might be putting in place many valuable services that are really needed, there are many dependent people in the community who need reassurances that their day hospital or day house will not close, because that is the message people in the community are getting. People have to travel for services where they might get a clinical support once a week. They have to come out of Ballinasloe to travel to Portumna. There were 28 people using the day hospital in Portumna. Now it appears they will have to go on an appointment system, the day house will close and they will have to attend a day hospital for a half hour slot. That is not how these mental health patients operate. These people like to go into their day house, make a cup of tea, sit down and have the reassurance of talking to each other. We are trying to box people into a situation that they are not used to.