John O'Mahony (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This is an issue for all Deputies in the House. It is a very good scheme, but it is a major issue for families with elderly parents waiting on the list, some of whom have taken out loans to pay €800 or €1,200 in some parts of the country. Last February, the waiting time was four weeks and it has grown rapidly to 16 weeks.

The health service plan is coming out in the next few weeks. The question is how a demand led scheme will be dealt with in that plan. There is a 4% increase annually in the number of people over 80 years and the issue is to try to find a solution. It is causing trauma and people who cannot care for the elderly at home want to try to get into the scheme. Four or five weeks was acceptable but 16 weeks is unacceptable. I want to hear that there is some plan to deal with it. This is clogging up beds in acute hospitals and it costs far more than beds in nursing homes. The argument put by nursing home owners and families is that rolling out the scheme could save money. I hope there is some way of dealing with it in the coming weeks and months. Will the waiting time increase to six months, eight months or 12 months? It can be argued that we are in crisis now but the longer timeframes would be unacceptable. There must be a reduction to reasonable waiting times.

See this speech in context