Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

That is frustrating because, on the face of it, it is such an easy problem to solve. We have 1,700 children who need help so we need to hire the people who can help them. We seem to be able to manage it in other parts of the country.

I thank the witnesses for their responses. I have one last question on latent private sector capacity. Fianna Fáil wants a public healthcare system that can deal with this. However, as with inpatient and outpatient services, the waiting list numbers are going up and up. One of the short-term measures that is working is the NTPF. Anecdotally, I am hearing that a fair number of our nurses working in the public system are moving over to the private system because the working conditions are better. Staff are treated well and staffing ratios are much better. They may not be getting more money but the working environment is much better and does not have the highly objectionable stresses and strains that are a feature of the public system.

Is it the case that we have enough speech and language therapists in the country to serve the population and that we are seeing a migration of them everywhere or in some places from public health posts to operating in private practice? If this additional private sector capacity exists, would an extension of the National Treatment Purchase Fund as a short-term sticking plaster be something that could be used to reduce these waiting lists and get these children, who have been waiting three years, the help they need?