Dan Neville (Limerick, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The case I made for the provision of inpatient psychiatric beds for children and adolescents has not been answered. I clearly asked why the recommendation in A Vision for Change that 20-bed units should be provided by 2011 has not been adopted. It was stated in A Vision for Change that the number of psychiatric beds urgently needed to be increased to 100 by 2011. That has not happened. As the Minister of State said, we now have 58 such beds. That falls far short of the 100 beds that should have been provided by 2011 in line with the recommendation in A Vision for Change. Maybe the Minister of State will inquire for me whether a national review of psychiatric inpatient beds took place in 2011, as firmly recommended in A Vision for Change. If such a review took place, what was the result of it? I remind the House that it was recommended in A Vision for Change that by 2011, no child or adolescent should be admitted to an inpatient bed. The Minister of State is correct when he says there has been a considerable improvement. It is a shame to have to say, four years after the recommendation that no child anywhere in the country should be admitted to an adult inpatient bed should have been implemented, that there were 89 such admissions last year. I appreciate that there have been improvements in outpatient services and in other areas, but they are not the subject of this Topical Issue debate. I am asking about the provision of a 20-bed inpatient psychiatric unit for children and adolescents in Limerick to serve the mid-west region. That is the point I am making in this debate. I have not yet received a reply. Why did the development of such a unit not take place? Why was it scrapped?

See this speech in context