Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, Independent) | Oireachtas source

They are not appalling. The following are words from Family Carers Ireland's submission, "These findings are a damning indictment of Government’s attitude towards carers and are completely at odds with Sláintecare’s core objective - to shift the delivery of care from an acute setting towards care in the community and home." Is the Minister of State saying those figures are wrong?

The other point it made very clearly is that the hours a carer can work or study per week must be increased from 15 to 18.5. It is very important to implement such an increase. I would like to see a genuine approach from Government to deal with these issues. We should be looking at putting money into issues such as these rather than at cutting taxes.

See this speech in context