Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank my colleague, Deputy James Browne, for introducing a very positive motion. We all embrace what A Vision for Change is trying to do. It is a roadmap to achieve proper and substantive community-based mental health services and to improve existing services. My criticism of what is happening is not of the Minister of State, Deputy McEntee, who was recently in my constituency in Dublin 15 to talk about the work with Jigsaw projects and youth mental health, which is very important. She has embraced the role very positively.

I am reminded of what the national director of mental health services, Anne O’Connor, said on television in the spring when she was asked about recruitment in the mental health area. When she was asked why she did not spend her allocated budget she said that people emigrate and travel and that is just the way it is. That was her justification for returning the funding to the Department and the HSE. We need a total change of attitude at the top level of the HSE in the mental health area if we are ever going to deliver and implement A Vision for Change. It is a strategy that works but, for example, when we take child and adolescent mental health services there is a massive haemorrhaging of existing community-based teams in many areas. Staff members on maternity leave and sick leave are not replaced and people must wait for significant periods to get help. Families are in despair. Figures indicate that more than half the staffing posts are not being filled and we need a proper recruitment strategy to ensure we fill the posts that have been advertised, as that is crucial. I will hand over to my colleague.

See this speech in context