Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail)

Of course, primary care in mental health services.

One of the things about primary care and the waiting lists for psychologists is that there is €750,000 in the mental health budget every year to support ten counselling psychologists through their careers in Trinity College. That is one of the things we did about three years ago because we had to create a pathway so that more counselling psychologists would come through in mental health.

The waiting lists for primary care psychology are off the scale. It is about 18,000 at the moment and the pressure that is putting on the CAMHS waiting list is undeniable. The majority of the primary care waiting list is in the Cork and Kerry region, where about 12,000 children are waiting, off the top of my head. There have been several issues in trying to recruit psychologists to that area. However, I have taken to the road recently and visited 21 different CAMHS teams and in every one there was a clinical psychologist and counselling psychologist in place, which I am pleased to report. However, primary care sits separately from CAMHS and is driving a huge issue.