Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I take the Deputy's point. Her arguments are very well made. If home care is not available, what is the result? More people end up stuck in hospital with delayed discharges. More people end up in nursing homes long before they need to go into a nursing home. That is not right. People should have the autonomy to stay in their home for as long as they can. As the Deputy acknowledged, it is not a matter of money. The amount of money provided for home care has increased dramatically in the last couple of years. It has probably increased by 40% or 50%, if it has not doubled in recent years. The kind waiting lists we used to have that were a result of inadequate budgets are no longer the issue. The issue is finding and retaining adequate staff to provide home care. That is a real challenge.

One area that my Department operates is the work permit system. Home care workers are currently on the ineligible occupations list. In order to have an occupation removed from this list, there needs to be a clear demonstration that recruitment difficulties are solely due to skills and labour shortages in Ireland and the European Economic Area, EEA, and not to other factors such as salary or employment conditions. The view of my Department is that removing home care workers from the ineligible occupations list would not solve the problem. What we need is a more comprehensive, longer term approach, dealing with the wider issues the Deputy mentioned such as pay, career progression and costing. I appreciate this needs to be done sooner rather than later.

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