Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Deputy for that contribution. He is right that while some things might work in one area, they might not work in another area. The most important thing any parent or teacher would want is that there is proper clinical governance. That is the most important piece. I totally understand why no principal, board or organisation would take on that risk as it is not their field. The risk of the clinical governance should sit with the HSE.

The point here is that we would have had conversations in the past three months on grant-aiding schools and that perhaps that would have a quick effect. There is a real understanding that the parents of children in some of the special schools are totally frustrated that there has been no intervention since their children have gone inside the front gate. I totally understand that but to be fair to the Department of Education, the Minister, Deputy Foley, and the Minister of State, Deputy Naughton, they are not prepared to take on that responsibility and risk as it is the risk of the HSE. They are saying they want the HSE and the CNDTs to do the recruitment or to do the placement of the private therapist in the schools and to let them own the risk. That is what is happening in the Cork situation and I hope that it will come to an end fairly soon.

The National Disability Authority, NDA, review is ongoing and will look at staff teams and see how the model actually works because we have 91 teams and they are positioned all around the country. There are two specialist teams. We are also looking at a paediatric team for children who are discharged from hospital. We are working up that team as well.

The Deputy is correct in that it is very hard to judge a model when it is not fully staffed. I would like to think we are in this interim space where we are trying to fill those vacancies, to make it attractive, to look perhaps at the apprenticeship model and to do whatever we can to fill the vacancies. One can then make a fair assessment as to whether it works or does not work. It is not fair on the staff who are working flat out to ensure there is a service there. They are working very hard as are all the teams around the country but they are working under extreme pressure in not having fully staffed teams.

I would not be doing my job if I did not spend money procuring services where I can procure them to ensure families get interventions.