Mr. Damian Ginley:

Yes, there is a challenge across the entire service. The genesis of our submission is to ask the Government to clarify exactly how it wishes home care to be provided. We have finally established terms and conditions of employment for healthcare support assistants that give them an annual salary ranging from just under €30,000 to just under €40,000 per annum for full-time work. They are finally being recognised. Despite that, we are still hitting barriers from a recruitment point of view in the HSE. In fairness to the HSE managers we are engaging with - for example, there was a recent meeting with CHO area 8 - there is acceptance that there has to be a localised approach to try to speed up recruitment because delays in the HSE magnify the situation.