Michael McNamara (Clare, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister's commitment to ensuring these services at Raheen and Regina House community nursing units open as soon as possible. There is a further problem, however, for people who receive these services. Some of these people would also hope to receive home help at some point. There is an incredible disparity in the distribution of home help hours in the mid-west. The population aged over 65 in Limerick is 21,032. In Clare, it is 13,292 and in the north Tipperary-east Limerick area it is slightly less, at just under 13,000. Despite this, when one looks at the number of people in receipt of home help hours per month in 2015, in Limerick, it is 1,437, in Clare, it is 961, and in north Tipperary-east Limerick, it is 1,241. When one looks at the actual hours allocated, there is a similar discrepancy, which is inexplicable. Why does the population in north Tipperary-east Limerick receive one and a half times the number of home help hours received by the population in Clare? It is an appalling inequality and one that needs to be addressed. Progress has been made in the lifetime of this Dáil in this regard but not enough progress. A lot more needs to be done.

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