Patricia Ryan (Kildare South, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I wish to address the waiting lists for child and adolescent mental health services, CAMHS, in County Kildare, where I come from. This is more important now than ever. It has always been important. There is an ongoing crisis in CAMHS. The waiting list comes up every year. The Minister and his predecessors have wrung their hands and promised that things would improve but all the evidence shows that they have not. There is a recruitment crisis, ongoing delays and children are being turned away from the service because their symptoms do not match the severity that the service is struggling to cope with.

Children continue to be admitted to adult services and there is no 24-7 service. This is even more shocking in the context of the €17.4 billion, and rising, health budget.

I spoke to a father during the week who told me it would have been better for his son if he had presented with cancer because at least there would have been a swift diagnosis and a clear path to care for him. This is a shocking indictment of the reality of mental health services for young people. I also spoke with a mother who sleeps in her teenage daughter's room. She sleeps there because of fear and because she feels that if she does not sleep there that daughter will take her own life. These people are being left behind by a system that is broken, that can barely deal with the most serious cases and that certainly cannot stop the rising tide of cases that become serious much more quickly because of neglect. Many people with mental health issues are trapped in a vicious circle. This circle sees them discharged from the system as quickly as possible with a handful of tablets. Inevitably, they return in a worse state and we need a lifelong approach to ensure their health is maintained. Health is about mental health and about keeping it maintained.

I urge the Minister to start taking this crisis seriously. Urgent action is needed to address the situation. It is important that we get full implementation of A Vision for Change. We need fully staffed child and adolescent mental health services, CAMHS, teams, investment into mental health primary care and a school curriculum for positive mental health. We also need these changes to begin today. We do not need more reports, meetings and passing of the buck. We need this to be looked at now. Sadly, the delay in addressing this crisis is costing lives. This needs to stop now.

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