Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We have the staff now. There are many staff in our Intreo offices around the country. When unemployment was three times what it is now, the Department and Government did not have the staff. That is why JobPath was brought in as an additional provider to provide these services to assist people to get into employment. The context is now changing and we need to use those models in other areas. We used a similar model with the National Treatment Purchase Fund, NTPF, to reduce waiting lists significantly in areas in the public health service where we do not have capacity.

Waiting lists for hospital procedures on hips, eyes, knees and cataracts and for angiograms have fallen every month for almost a year and half. They are now lower than they were when the Government came to office because we used the private sector to augment our public services. It makes sense to do that on occasion.

See this speech in context