David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I understand that and I look forward to getting the data share. My final point on this is that notwithstanding that, it strikes me as odd that agencies can provide staff for many of these services but we cannot recruit those staff into the public sector. If there is a premium and an increased cost, how is it that agencies can recruit these staff yet hospitals or non-acute settings cannot? I ask that this be addressed in the context of whatever briefing paper is given to us as well.

On a related matter, I wish to come to one of the regional issues. I gave prior notice to Mr. Connaghan that I would raise this issue. A briefing note on child and adolescent mental health services, CAMHS, was given to Oireachtas Members in the south east. Waterford and Wexford form one catchment area for CAMHS. We had five child psychiatrist positions at University Hospital Waterford last year. One of the psychiatrists retired and three resigned citing workload, poor infrastructure and not being listened to. They resigned out of frustration and annoyance at not getting answers to questions they were putting. The briefing note I have been given by the Department states that with effect from Friday, 6 July, there will only be one consultant paediatric psychiatrist employed in the Waterford area and that person will be on annual leave from 9 July 2018, which was pre-booked in April. In other words, we will have no child psychiatrist at all in Waterford - none. The only service being supplied at the moment is an agency consultant coming from Galway to do a clinic at weekends. The actual child psychiatrist provision and the resultant care they would give to people is almost non-existent.

How did it get to the sorry state that we are left with one child psychiatrist in one hospital? This is an issue throughout the State. The briefing note also states there is difficulty in recruiting child psychiatrists. How did we end up in a situation whereby three psychiatrists resigned, with the reasons they have given, not on Mr. Connaghan's watch but certainly on the HSE's watch, and whereby for a period there will be no cover whatsoever in one of our major acute hospitals? How did this happen?