Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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The pay agreement was extremely necessary to address a very legitimate grievance of the differential between HSE workers and people who work in agencies, both section 56s and section 39s. The pay agreement has a big impact in Tusla as well. It has a cost of €20 million this year and a cost of €56 million in 2024. So our overall budget in disability in 2024 will be increasing by another €41 million and that will be dealt with in the course of 2024. It is a very significant additional investment supporting staff. I believe it will have an impact by enhancing the ability of section 39s to recruit and, particularly, to retain staff because we know retention is as significant an issue.