Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for raising this matter and apologise on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Health, that he is not here this evening. He has a commitment that he has to keep and he asked me if I would respond to the Deputy.

Government policy is to support older people to live at home and in their communities for as long as possible. This is realised by the Health Service Executive through a range of community-based services such as mainstream home help and enhanced home care packages or by other supports such as meals-on-wheels and respite or day care. These services, often delivered in partnership with non-statutory agencies, are designed to be as flexible as possible to best meet the needs of individual recipients and their families.

Government for National Recovery 2011-2016 commits to developing and implementing national standards for home support services, which will be subject to inspection by the Health and Information Quality Authority, HIQA. New statutory regulation of this sector will have to take account of various issues, such as those raised in a recent report of the Law Reform Commission, entitled Legal Aspects of Professional Home Care. This, in turn, is a follow-up to its 2009 consultation paper, Legal Aspects of Carers.

Primary legislation and resources will be required for the introduction of a statutory regulation system for home care services. The question of possible changes to legislation, including regulation and inspection for home care services for older people, is under consideration. The Department is at present examining this matter in the overall context of the licensing of health care providers. Legislation is being prepared in this area, taking into account various recommendations of the Commission on Patient Safety and the Law Reform Commission. Various options are being considered, including the complex legal issues involved and the need to prioritise legislation across the social care area overall, including that relating to children and disabilities.

It is important to emphasise that statutory regulation or licensing is only one way of improving the safety and quality of services and that other measures have or are being taken to improve the standards of community service for older people delivered by, or on behalf of, the HSE. These are reflected in the HSE service plan 2012 and include a public procurement framework for home care services finalised earlier this year, with quality and screening requirements. In addition, various operational initiatives such as new national quality guidelines for home care support services and new national home help guidelines have been developed by the HSE. These various measures, taken together, have been designed to improve relevant aspects of HSE home care nationally, including non-statutory provision for care recipients under the auspices of the executive.

The Government has embarked on a major reform programme for the health system, the aim of which is to deliver a single-tier system where access is based on need, not income. A number of important steps will be achieved in a planned way, including regulation of the specific sectors I have outlined, and each of these will play a critical role in improving our health and personal social services overall.

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