Pádraic McCormack (Galway West, Fine Gael)

Various representations have been made to me recently about the cut-back in the availability of home help. The people cannot understand this given that the Minister said in his Budget Statement that an extra €30 million has been allocated to the home help service, and 1.75 million extra hours, yet home help has been cut back.

In a recent survey 97% of those surveyed said they would like to continue to live in their own homes, in their own environment, for as long as possible, and home help assistants enable them to do that. I have been dealing with a particular case in my constituency since December. Three years ago an elderly Alzheimer's patient in north Connemara, whose son looked after her in her own home, had eight hours home help. Last October the home help was cut back to four hours. Since then I have been unable to have the four hours home help restored. People with Alzheimer's do not improve, rather they are inclined to get worse.

I wrote to the Health Service Executive western area and I was informed in a letter dated 16 December that there are some people in the Clonbur area who would work in the evenings, but as there is an embargo on recruitment the posts cannot be filled. As I was surprised to hear that, I tabled a parliamentary question to the Minister on 25 January and the following is her reply.

My Department has not imposed limits on the recruitment of home help assistants. It is a matter for the Health Service Executive to determine the appropriate staffing mix. . .

I got back to my good friends in the HSE western area and they said that, of course, there is an embargo.

Irrespective of which Minister responds I do not want him or her to read out the prepared script. If that happens I will walk out. I want to know why, given that the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children has been allocated an extra €30 million in the budget and, according to her reply, is providing 1.75 million extra home help hours, the poor man in the Clonbur area cannot have the four hours home help service restored to him that he had last October.

To put the matter beyond all doubt, on 8 February 2006 I tabled three questions to the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children, in different formats, in case I was slipping up in any way, asking whether there was a cut-back in the number of home help assistants. She stated:

As I indicated to the Deputy in response to a previous question, the Department of Health and Children has allocated an additional €30 million to the home help service in 2006, which will allow for the development of the service. That funding will provide for an additional 1.75 million home help hours in 2006 and not 1.6 million, as I previously advised the Deputy [in December].

The number of hours is increasing but the four hours from which the man in question benefited cannot be restored. A message should be sent to the officials in the Health Service Executive western area stating the home help hours are being cut back and not being restored and that the Tánaiste is talking rubbish.

If we do not keep the elderly in their own communities for as long as possible, it will be a great loss to those communities and the elderly persons' families. The presence of grandparents among their grandchildren can be vital to the development of the latter. I know this because I have grandchildren.

We are doing a grave disservice to people in rural areas and elsewhere if we put the elderly into institutional care unnecessarily. This will happen in the case in question if the necessary home help hours are not restored. It is not too much to allocate to somebody the same number of home help hours he or she was entitled to last October. That was before the budget in which the imaginary €30 million was allocated, thereby increasing the home help hours by 1.75 million.

I have been told to ring various people about this issue. I rang a lady called Mo Flynn and she said it had nothing to do with her and transferred me to somebody else. Will the Minister of State tell the officials of the HSE western area that they have the authority to grant more home help hours? The man who is minding his mother in his own home in Clonbur has a lady available to work the extra four hours if they are restored. However, the HSE tells me there is an embargo on recruitment such that it cannot appoint anybody.

I ask the Minister of State not to read out a prepared script telling me the amount of money or hours allocated because I will walk out if he does so. All I want is for him to ring up the officials in the HSE and state there is no embargo on recruitment, restore the four hours' home help for the man in question and employ somebody to help his mother stay in her home for as long as possible rather than have her put into institutional care. The Minister of State, Deputy Treacy, will give him the names of the person dealing with the Connemara area and the person in charge of home help in the HSE.

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