Ms Audry Deane:

I want to draw the conversation back to the fact that we are talking about people - frail vulnerable people, their loved ones, families and communities. I deeply welcome the degree of technical expertise by all the stakeholders here, as no doubt do Deputies and Senators. However, we should remind ourselves that the culture and values of the HSE are care, compassion, trust and learning. I am a member of the National Patient Forum. We have marvellous, creative and very inspiring discussions about coproduction and codesign of services but I am not hearing any of this today. Therefore, I want to bring the person back into the room. As we speak about the back end technical part of this, which is obviously failing and not fit for purpose, every day and hour there are people in wholly unacceptable conditions. Age Action is not at the technical end of this which we are leaving to our esteemed colleagues but the calls to our organisation are frankly heartbreaking. The people out there do not know their entitlements and do not care about the back office technical end because they are suffering. As Yeats would say, we are in the rag and bone shop of the heart. The elected members here have a responsibility to be part of the robust discussion, which must happen in our society, about how we will arrive at a statutory home care system which is adequately funded and which meets need.