Thomas Pringle (Donegal South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute. I agree with Deputy Boyd Barrett in respect of the cuts. It is the worst kind of cutback when home helps are being targeted in this way. The Taoiseach referred to saving only €8 million out of €200 million spent on home help services every year. It means much more to people in their daily lives. Over the past week or two, I have been contacted by a number of elderly people, including a 91 year-old man who will lose the two half hour periods of home help he receives every week. He lives on his own and wants to continue to do so. The service has been withdrawn to save €8 million and to cut 450,000 hours of home help support. A family, in which the mother suffers from Alzheimer's, is struggling to keep her out of a nursing home because they want to keep in her home environment. The HSE has cut the hour provided on a Saturday to help put the mother to bed. These cuts are taking place throughout the country. The HSE dresses it up by saying the same number of people receive a service based on medical need and by saying that 50,000 people receive the service. This is the reality of what such cuts are inflicting on people. I agree with the argument on privatisation, which is coming. We have it in Donegal and every other county. Privatisation is nonsensical and short-sighted in a budgetary sense. Keeping people at home saves money in the long run.

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