Patrick Costello (Dublin South Central, Green Party)
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I want to pick up on some of the points made by Deputy Ward, in particular the excellent point about the failure of mental health services to meet the challenge of dual diagnosis, which is very significant. Dr. Niazi said that if there is a primary diagnosis of mental health, the psychiatric services would deal with it, and if there is a primary diagnosis of addiction, the addiction services would deal with it. My personal experience of working with and supporting people trying to access these services is that both services claim the primary issue is for the other service, which is what leads to people falling between the cracks and points to the problem of these services not working together. It fundamentally illustrates Mr. Farrelly’s point that the mental health services are not fit for purpose. I thank Deputy Ward for raising this very important issue.

I would like to pick up on Dr. Finnerty's point around the inconsistency throughout the country in community services. Will she talk more about that, especially focusing on areas that have done it well? What can we learn from them? What can other services that have not done it well learn from the services that have done it well? What has contributed to the success of those services amidst the inconsistency?