Jim Daly (Cork South West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

That is essentially a management issue. A system must be put in place to regulate it. I agree that it must be very annoying for those delivering the service to only be able to get 12 hours if they want to do more. It is possible that there may be three or four home helps in a small area and a limited number of hours in that area, whereas in a more built-up area there may be more hours available. It is a management issue. John Hayes is the manager of CHO 1, which also has home help managers. It is up to them to allocate the available resources. I do not micromanage such issues, although I would be interested to see the disparities between CHOs and the different approaches taken because there are some differences. Good lessons could be learned from the CHOs sharing that information. I accept the Deputy's point that it is difficult to understand the disparity. Any statutory scheme would be on a more standardised footing and would apply across the country.

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