Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

CAMHS is an area in which I have taken an interest. Part of my interest stems from an experience I had before I was elected, when I spoke to a community mental health nurse I was representing about an allowance that he may have been due. He asked if I minded him leaving his phone on during the meeting because he had several children in his care who were effectively on suicide watch. I am grateful for that experience in a way because it was something that I had not encountered until that point and I was struck by the fact that this person was trying to provide a service in strained circumstances and was trying to do his best but he was very stretched. It had not occurred to me that this need was there among children and adolescents and I did not know about the extent of that need. I talked to people who provide that service and they are fantastic. The Minister of State will acknowledge that they are working in very strained circumstances. They would like to do more and they would like to provide a real safety net. I know from speaking with people in my community that youth mental health is a particular concern and people want to able to see those services and that safety net provided because they can see that not having those services in place for children can lead to problems in later life. The longer they go without help, the harder it is when that help eventually arrives, if it arrives when they are adults.

There is no one, in this Chamber or outside it, whose life has not been touched by a mental health issue, either concerning themselves, their family, their friends or people in their community. We have become very aware of the scale and disparate nature of mental health illness recently and I say that to refer to my initial point that I was not aware of the extent to which child and adolescent mental health was such an issue, that help was so badly needed and what could be done when it was done right. People are now starting to talk about the scale and the challenge that is posed by consistent and persistent underfunding of services which leads to understaffing.

A cursory look at the state of affairs reveals that the CAMHS service has barely half of the necessary staff needed under A Vision for Change. I recall when the strategy was launched. It was a ten-year project but it is now 12 years' old. It has ceased to have any meaning because so much of it remains unimplemented. Waiting lists for a first assessment have gone through the roof. At the end of October, 2,250 children in my area were waiting to access services, 286 of whom were waiting more than a year simply to access their first appointment. Some 105 of those young people had been waiting in excess of 18 months. It gets to the stage where none of this can be called early intervention because of the length of the wait. It ceases to be early intervention. In my community of Fingal, we only have 63% of the staff necessary for CAMHS with 177 young people waiting for a first assessment. Every expert in child and adolescent mental health says that early intervention is vital to avoid enduring and worsening problems into the future. I do not need to convince the Minister of State of that because he is aware of it but we only have 63% of the staff necessary. I represent an area that has one of the youngest populations in Europe and the number of young people is growing quickly.

That is brilliant but the services are not there for them. We do not have enough people to provide those services.

Mental health issues are emergency health issues. The Minister of State would not expect someone with a physical health emergency to wait over a year for treatment, yet young people with mental health problems are expected to wait. In 2019, we need to see increased and targeted investment from this Government to help those soaring waiting lists and ensure people can access the services they need.

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