Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I wish to raise statutory home care. It is another feature of the programme for Government. There has been a serious beefing up of home care hours in budget 2021. Just yesterday we had another report released, which again gives us an insight into the major strain nursing homes have been under since March. Many families with elderly people in the care of nursing homes are saying that if the mechanisms were in place, they would much rather have those loved ones in a home environment where they could be cared for by a care professional.

I have been digging deep into all of this and there is a certain type of person who goes into working in home care in Ireland and the OECD has statistics on this. Home carers in Ireland are 80% female and they are of a certain demographic. There is a trend in western European countries but there are also barriers to these people entering this type of work. Many people who have made representations to me would like to take on this type of work. One can train quickly and successfully as a care assistant but there are barriers if one is on a low income or in taxation bands that do not make it worthwhile.

In any given community such as the rural community I come from, there could be 14 or 15 people in direct nursing home care and there could be two or three people at community level in receipt of a social welfare payment or in a low-paid job. If procedures were to be adjusted and if there was a little bit of ingenuity between the Department of Health and the Department of Finance, a lot more people at ground level could be helped to get to the statutory home care phase an awful lot more quickly. They tell me the barriers mostly relate to taxation bands and finance. There needs to be an incentive to do it. Statutory home care is a feature of the programme for Government and I would like to hear if that has been progressed since the Minister took up office.