Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this opportunity to speak. It is a motion that embodies what we have been saying for a long time on all sides of the House on mental health and the need to implement A Vision for Change. Deputy Browne said we have already had three debates in this Parliament on mental health. It would be a fine thing if we were debating where we will spend the money that had been committed to mental health and A Vision for Change but over the last number of years we are consistently pointing out that insufficient funds are being made available on an annual basis. The €35 million that has been ring fenced for the mental health budget over the last number of years has been consistently pilfered year after year. The spin at every Estimate and every budget is that €35 million will be made available to mental health and the implementation of A Vision for Change. Then we find there is prevarication, delay, a reduction in the budget and excuses are made about the inability to recruit and it is claimed they cannot find the required personnel or clinicians. It is simply not good enough anymore.

The Minister of State is new in her job but the bottom line is it stops with Government decisions and Government policy. The Minister of State has been handed a very bad card in trying to implement and fund a key commitment in the supply and confidence arrangement between Fianna Fáil and the Government. It is critically important that the central tenet of that supply and confidence agreement is acknowledged and A Vision for Change is implemented in full over the lifetime of the Government. That means providing €35 million for the next number of years to make sure we catch up with the deficit that is there currently. If one looks at the figures and statistics with regard to the number of people that have been recruited, over the last six years there has been a 7% increase in recruitment of key personnel as recommended in A Vision for Change. We are still a long way behind what we should be in terms of the numbers. Every aspect of mental health services in this country is underfunded, under-resourced and incapable of delivering the service that is required. When we talk about citizenship and about the need to be inclusive, to embrace people and to allow people to fulfil their opportunities, we need to ensure they are given every assistance.

In the area of child and adolescent mental health services, we clearly have huge problems right across the whole spectrum. The first major mistake made was in the context of withdrawal of career guidance counsellors in our schools. The attack on young people who need access to services is something I find very distasteful. It has been happening consistently. We should have a bit of honesty about the fact that A Vision for Change is the document we are all signed up to. It needs to be supported and bulwarked by financial resources and services and by ensuring that key personnel are put in place. We have consistently heard we cannot find the specialists. The problem is we do not have any plan in place to ensure there is consistent recruitment, training, education and retention of key personnel. That has been a distinct failure in Government policy over the last number of years.

The Government has committed to it in its programme for Government. We are only trying to advise it to implement what it has said itself. We were unsure of the Government's commitment so we insisted it was put into the supply and confidence arrangement to ensure it would be part and parcel of what we are committed to supporting in the context of this Government. We are doing it because for a number of years mental health has been discussed ad infinitumin this Chamber but unfortunately the resourcing and commitment has not been forthcoming from Cabinet. That has been consistent since 2011. If one looks back at the figures on the number of people who were retained in the service, the number of whole-time equivalents, it shows quite clearly there has been an appalling lack of commitment and determination in terms of implementation.

This motion is critically important. The Government still has time to redeem itself by ensuring a strong commitment is shown in 2017 to ensure we can play catch up in terms of the deficiency of services across all levels. We still have a very distasteful circumstance in our public hospitals where people with psychiatric problems and mental illnesses who try to access out of hours services are finding themselves presenting in emergency departments across the country. That is happening to this day. It is wholly unacceptable for those individuals.

The broader issues of pressure in terms of mental health among younger cohorts of people is something we are singularly failing to address in any meaningful way other than with lip service to a certain extent.

I wish the Minister, Deputy Simon Harris, was here to hear but I am sure the Minister of State, Deputy McEntee, will relay to him the concerns of the House with regard to the lack of commitment in view of the fact that €35 million was promised on budget day yet within a week it was confirmed it would be an awful lot less. Overall, a lot of work needs to be done but more importantly there is an opportunity at this late stage to comply with the spirit of the agreement and the programme for Government and, more importantly, to have a meaningful impact on people whose lives depend on the mental health services.

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