Ms Rosarii Mannion:

I will submit it in writing. I thank Deputy Carey for his questions. We identified succession planning and workforce planning as a gap in our people strategy. We have set up a full unit to look at integrated workforce planning. The unit will also deal with some of the points made by Deputy Buckley. We have every piece of data needed to do workforce planning with regard to our consultant workforce. We know that 25% of consultants in psychiatry are over 55 years of age. We have contract type, age profile, gender, tenure, full time or part time and approval status. We did not have this heretofore but we have all of it now. It will only be valuable if we use it effectively.

One of the reasons we are in this difficulty is that we have not been doing any integrated workplace planning. That is not a quick fix. We need to build up to integrated workforce planning. It starts with getting the data, the ICT enablers, the systems, etc. I do not want members to think this is not happening; it is happening but it will take time.

The devolvement of decision-making happened in the latter half of 2017. The chief officer has the entire decision-making accountability as to what can be recruited locally and what can be recruited centrally. In doing that, it is important that we do not introduce any risk to the system in respect of medical clearances, occupational health clearances, Garda vetting, contract type, pensions, etc. These are complex issues that are sometimes better done in a central location. The chief officer is the staff member who can make that decision and we are happy to support whatever that is. There is no difficulty; recruitment can happen locally. It is not the case that recruitment is not happening in an effort to save money or that this is a way around saying there is no funding available for these specific posts. Funding is available for posts in mental health.