Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 26 May 2022

Public Accounts Committee

2020 Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 38 - Health (Resumed)
Health Service Executive: Financial Statements 2020

9:30 am

Photo of Brian StanleyBrian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I am thinking of the example of retrofitting houses. Some of us would have known that was coming and said that we needed to start training apprentices on how to retrofit. I have observed this morning how many of the answers come down to the lack of recruits and then, obviously, retention is an issue. If people come into a system that is overloaded they are not inclined to stay because they are overworked.

So, with dentists, at this point, at Secretary General in the Department and CEO level of the HSE what is being done? What is being said to the Government? The Minister for Further and Higher Education Research Innovation and Science comes in to this too. We need to train more dentists. Are we only offering them short-term contracts when they come out of training and they say "Get lost with that, I'm off to Australia where I can get a permanent job"? What is happening there? Are they not going into the system? Are we telling people in the universities that there is a career path here for them? Are we saying that we need good dentists in the country and it is a good, solid, rewarding job with plenty of work?