Frank O'Rourke (Kildare North, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy James Browne for bringing forward this Bill in the area of mental health, which is so important to so many of us. The whole service for mental health is simply not being delivered, despite the funding that has been put into it, and a number of speakers have illustrated this quite eloquently.

I recently debated a Topical Issues matter with the Minister related to the Kildare North service, where, as recently as last Christmas, a man with mental health issues showed up and was told to go away as the service could do nothing for him. Prior to that, a child on suicide watch who had been allowed to move from A to B without supervision went missing for over five days on two occasions. There are many examples of where services are not in place. When I met the Minister, Deputy Simon Harris, last July, I told him about a good service in operation in Celbridge known as the Abbey Community Project. It is a voluntary organisation with qualified, trained counsellors and psychiatrists that has been operating for ten years and deals with people with a dual diagnosis. The Minister said this model should be developed. For the past two years I have been dealing with the HSE, the Department of Health and the task force on the provision of funding for this organisation, but it has not received one cent. It operates on bucket collections. When its public liability insurance policy was due for renewal recently, everyone involved had to put in a few quid to pay for it. That is not balanced mental health services provision. The Abbey Community Project in Celbridge services much of north Kildare and has in excess of 90 cases. It receives referrals from the HSE, but it gets no State funding. The Minister said this model should be developed and supported, but for two years this organisation has not received one cent in funding. No one is giving it any support, good, bad or indifferent. How long can a voluntary organisation that is providing a service that is not being provided by the State continue to exist without support? It is shocking. The people reporting with mental health issues have nowhere to go. If we are to get real, we need to deliver. We need to put funding into the right services. Let us stop talking and provide the services needed.

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