Mr. Richard Flaherty:

I am seeing first hand the difficulty in recruitment. In our cancer support centre in Galway, we have three senior clinical psychologists who work around the clock counselling people individually. Unfortunately, one of our senior psychologists left the service a couple of months ago and we are finding it incredibly difficult to replace her. We are up against the HSE in terms of recruitment, pension entitlements and pay entitlements. It is definitely a challenge for us to recruit the type of staff that is needed when up against the HSE. It is a major challenge and it is one that will not be resolved overnight. It is proving a challenge for us because the workload is increasing. If someone drops off our services and moves away, we are finding it very hard to replace her.