Erin McGreehan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I was in the Seanad earlier so my apologies for missing some of the contributions. I will look back at the answers. My issues are very similar to those discussed by other members in the area of recruitment. Senator Seery Kearney and I had a great meeting last week with a team in Dublin for the PDS and children's disability network teams, CDNTs. What it is doing is fantastic, but it is about getting the resources and the staff. I was interested in listening about that recruitment programme. Once one gets into the system there is care, and we see that across all the HSE services. Once one is in the system, one is taken care of. We need to get to that point. There is a bottleneck and the waiting lists are endlessly disappointing, frustrating and heartbreaking. While they are numbers or names on a page, they are children and families.

I do not have questions because many of them have been answered, particularly regarding recruitment. We need drastic change and a drastic shift in mindset in the country as to how we deal with, help and include people with disabilities. It is not just in the HSE but about moving everybody's mindset and moving from the medical model. Of course, the HSE is in tune with a medical model because that is what it does and that is its mindset. However, we have to change that to a social model for taking care of the person. The person is not ill, but needs the therapies and the step up in society and that equity. The therapists who are missing and who we are waiting for are that step up or equity for them, and all our citizens, to be the best they can be. I reiterate the frustration of parents and the heartbreak of children who are waiting on the waiting lists. The sooner we get those places filled, the better. I know the staff are at their wits' end trying to fill them, and I hope we fill them. It is cruel to both the morale of staff working in the HSE and, more importantly, to the children who have unmet needs.

The committee should do anything it can to push the recruitment and to have a long-term plan with other Departments, such as the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, to make sure we have that body of therapists coming on stream, to make sure that we are educating our workforce and to make sure that we have staff and people who can open the door through upskilling and continuous skills development to move into these therapies. It is a really worthwhile business to be in and for getting children to be their best selves. If I was talented and skilled enough and had that ability, it would be a wonderful place to be. Unfortunately, I do not think I would ever be fit to be able to do that. However, I hope the committee can help the witnesses to make sure we reduce those waiting lists and get those needs met.