Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for her response. I have a list of our back and forth, which shows quite how engaged she is. I acknowledge what she said about the assessment of services. She will also understand that at this stage the parents do not care why it was assessed wrongly. They do not have the therapists they need. They will not care about Excel. I have dealt with the HSE and I have heard about Excel spreadsheets previously. My question back to the HSE is why this did not raise questions for them. Why is it such an under-provision given that we know how serious this is and we know how the Minister of State has made directions on this? In the parents' words, we are talking about the most disabled children in the State. It is mind-numbing that the HSE would not have reacted more forcefully to challenge an assessment of that kind. There should be no need for the parents to have to be as engaged as they are on this issue. They should not have to contact people like me, the Minister of State or anybody else. It was anticipated and well flagged. There was no handover by the HSE when the social work services were removed. I know one woman whose 11-year-old son has extreme behavioural problems, and she has had no social worker since June. There was no handover. If I was going on holiday I would do a handover in order that somebody could cover my work. The HSE did not anticipate a handover for the social work need of this kind. This mother has had no behavioural therapy and no respite. The family is considering bringing the child to the emergency department because they have no place else to go at this stage.

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