Sorca Clarke (Longford-Westmeath, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the Chair and all our guests for coming in today. This Bill has been a long time coming, even to Committee Stage. I have several questions for each of the groups so I will ask each question specifically to the groups and they may respond. If they wish to respond to another question they think may be relevant to their area, please feel free to do so. I will do this in the order in which they spoke.

It is very important the Garda is here today. When the evaluation of its project is done, it is important it comes back to the health committee because we need to know what does and does not work. We need to know what resources are needed and if they are annual or multi-annual resources. I am specifically interested in what the witnesses spoke about regarding the evaluation of the Garda hours, the fact they are not necessarily being done on Garda work and the impact this is having on the funding. With the evaluation of Garda hours, what knock-on effect has the number of call-outs and hours put in had on other services asked of the Garda in Limerick? What changes to the Mental Health Bill from a policing perspective would An Garda Síochána like to see? The authorised officers were also mentioned. Will this also have an impact on the availability of gardaí to do the job they were hired for?

The IMO mentioned the ministerial involvement in the care plans. Can its representatives elaborate more on that? Has the IMO been informed of any potential training courses or additional resources that will be provided either from a professional organisation or the Department of Health to help doctors and staff navigate these new procedures and additional compliance that may be asked of them? In their opinion, do the witnesses think new consent requirements will have an impact or effect on doctor-patient relationships and the provision of treatment, both for that person at that point in time and into the future?

Is the Mental Health Commission aware there was an amendment submitted which sought to prohibit the in-patient treatment of children in adult psychiatric units and was ruled out of order? What is its opinion on that? The witnesses also spoke about the need for a dedicated unit of authorised officers and for those officers to be full-time. Does full-time mean 24-7 in this case or does it mean full-time office hours? How does the organisation see this working in practice with the expansion of authorised officers? As there are significant gaps in resources when it comes to staff where would the commission like to see these authorised officers coming from? What would this new unit look like in practice? Finally, in respect of section 51, the commission mentioned that the current threshold in the Bill is too low. What would the commission like to see that threshold look like?

Again, I ask the same question to Mental Health Reform regarding the amendment for children to not be treated in adult psychiatric units, given children are not merely small adults and have a specific set of needs of their own. What would an independent complaint mechanism look like to the organisation? How would it see this working in best practice and how would it be accessed? Would there be an appeals procedure if the independent complaints mechanism did not reflect the will of a person? Could the organisation provide us with more detail on that please?