Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Both the Senator and the Deputy raised the issue of Traveller health, so I will start there. They are both correct. We need to up our game in how we interact with the Traveller community about mental health and also general health issues. I visited Pavee Point a number of months ago and had a good engagement. The key question the Traveller community, through Pavee Point and its leaders, asked was if we would re-establish the structures in the Department of Health to enable it to engage with government and the State. We have given a commitment to do that. We had to alter those structures somewhat because the HSE has since come into being. There has already been engagement in recent days with the Traveller community about this. For example, some of my officials did a site visit and met members of the Traveller community. There was also a workshop to try to identify the needs of Travellers attended by both the chief nursing officer, Dr. Siobhán O'Halloran, who is here, and officials from the Department's social inclusion office. I do not speak for Pavee Point but there is a real effort here to recalibrate and renew that relationship. It is key after the efforts the Oireachtas made, quite rightly, to recognise ethnicity, and we are building on that now with the national Traveller and Roma inclusion strategy. I can give assurance the structure is now back in place in my Department. There is ongoing engagement and never again should a key stakeholder group be left out. I am satisfied with the engagement I have with the Traveller community, and I hope it is satisfied with it too.

I need to provide a note about the recruitment process for the assistant psychologists and psychologists. Given that a number of them were already in the system doing training, it may have been easier to identify and find them. I will convey a note to the committee and Chair. The Deputy is right about the recruitment process going well. One hears about 114 assistant psychologists, a global figure, but it is lovely to meet people in person. I opened the Tuam primary care centre on Monday, 2 July in the company of Deputy Rabbitte. I met two assistant psychologists, the psychologist and members of the CAMHS team at the event. The difference those two assistant psychologists are already making in Tuam through going into schools, working their way through waiting lists and so on is encouraging, but we need to build on this further. There seems to be significant excitement or enthusiasm in our mental health services about the potential this can have.

I take Senator Devine's comment about telepsychiatry and I welcome the interest shown by the committee in the issue. The Minister of State will deal with the matter of Linn Dara in a moment.

On agency spend - and I do not mean this in a confrontational way - members of this committee, including perhaps the Senator, would be among the first to criticise me if a service was not being delivered. As long as there are vacancies that are not being filled, we will not make apologies for doing everything we can to fill them. Of course, I would like to see agency spend reduced and people in full-time permanent posts in the health service, which we see in many areas. As long as vacancies exist, however, while working out the strategies to tackle them in a world where there is a global shortage, and while the Public Service Pay Commission, PSPC, does its work, we will continue to fill those vacancies through agency spend where we cannot fill them through permanent posts. I do not believe the Senator and I disagree on that, but it is an important point. When expenditure on agency staff increases, the political attack is often to ask why we are increasing it. We do so because there are sick people who need services today, whether they are physical or mental health services. I take the point about recruitment and retention, and I refer to my original answer that the PSPC was tasked by Government with specifically looking at recruitment and retention challenges for the health service. It will report this month and I will be guided by its findings.

I would be delighted to take a look at the committee report to which Deputy Martin referred. As I have not seen it directly, I will read it and revert to Deputies Martin and O'Loughlin. We work with the Department of Education and Skills through the pathfinder project, which is the interdepartmental work on mental health. The Minister for Education and Skills, Deputy Richard Bruton, made an announcement yesterday on that and I note the Deputy's comments on it. It is still important that mental health and suicide prevention are not viewed as only health issues, and I know the Deputy shares that view. There has to be a whole-of-Government and whole-of-society approach.