Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

In relation to Tusla, the Minister has put it very well. There is a joint protocol there and we are both in the one Department with the two line agencies reporting straight in. This means that it will be far more cohesive. When I came into the Department in 2020, the line of sight was not as clear as it is now and the funding was not as great as it is now. My budget was €2.3 million in 2020 whereas now my the budget is €9 million, for my side of the House. The Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, still has to come with his side of the House in relation to Tusla. Mine is the HSE side of the House.

The Deputy is right that this all stems from the crisis piece and the crisis piece stems from a lack of respite care and not enough therapists on our teams. Families are breaking down and are left with no option but to seek support for their loved ones in the form of residential care, which is not where families want to be by any manner or means. It is incumbent on us to ensure that we address the recruitment and retention crisis so that we have proper staffing levels. We have a suite of measures in place when it comes to respite support so that families feel supported in their communities and schools and children have access to resources in order to prevent crisis-like breaking down.

The Minister has spoken about workforce planning and working with the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science on bringing other layers on board to address the staffing need and the retention piece. It is important to put on the record that we do not have a pause on staffing at the moment in the HSE. There is a pause on administrative and management staff but there is no pause on the other layers that ensure that disability services function. The disability service has to function. Disability is in crisis and we need to ensure that the 700 therapist posts that I have funded and that are in our base are filled. I also want to ensure that section 38 organisations and the HSE itself can fill any vacancies they have. There is no embargo whatsoever on any layer within the section 39 organisations.