Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for raising this important issue. I also acknowledge my colleague, Deputy Christopher O'Sullivan, from the same area of Cork, who would echo Deputy Gould's frustration, and, indeed, he has done so. It is important to acknowledge that the HSE has had considerable challenges implementing the progressing disability services programme. This has resulted in delays for families trying to access much-needed therapies for their children. I regret that, of course, and I once again express my sincerest apologies to any family experiencing such delays and the hardship as articulated by the Deputy this evening. Behind every child is a family and siblings, and all of them are impacted by these situations.

In Cork, and indeed around the country, one of the issues with the reconfiguration has been staffing. To get a proper insight into the shortages that children's disability network teams, CDNTs, were facing, I asked the HSE to conduct a staff census across the network. I confirm to the House that it has found that 24% of posts are vacant because of statutory leave and unfilled vacancies. This means that the teams are, essentially, operating at 75% before considering any of the additional posts they need. The reality is that there are recruitment challenges due to the significant availability of new posts across the wider HSE, in areas such as primary care, services for older people and acute hospitals, as well as in the private sector. Coupled with this are temporary absences on some teams related to maternity leave and, in other instances, Covid-19-related sick leave.

This is not to make excuses, but to be open with the Deputy and the House regarding the issues I am trying to address to get the service to a level where children are receiving therapies, rather than languishing on waiting lists. In Cork specifically, as the Deputy will be aware, the children's disability network teams have been reconfigured since April 2021. I travelled down with Deputy Christopher O'Sullivan and met representatives of Enable Ireland during the summer. There are 14 CDNTs in the Cork-Kerry community healthcare area and the location of each aligns with the 14 community healthcare networks. Each network team is managed by a lead agency, namely, the Cope Foundation, the Brothers of Charity, Enable Ireland, Co-Action or St Joseph's Foundation. I met representatives of all those organisations in the last three months to articulate exactly the issues the Deputy raised this evening, namely, how we are going to get the interventions, how long children are waiting and when we can cut the waiting lists to ensure there are timely interventions. I want to get rid of this situation where securing assessments of needs has turned into an industry. What families need is intervention.

In 2021, I secured an additional 100 posts as part of the HSE national service plan 2021 to bolster the teams across the country. Teams in Cork and Kerry received an additional 7.5 posts from this overall pot. In addition, another 85 posts were added under the special schools allocation mid-year last year. An additional 5.8 posts were also added. This was a total uplift of 13.3 posts in 2021, six of which have now been filled. I will share with the Deputy what I found out yesterday, which is that of 180 posts, recruitment has only successful filled 50. That is my challenge. I know what needs to happen but I cannot magic people into posts. The Government has provided the funding, we have done the reconfiguration and the staff are working at 150%. I hear from all my colleagues around me the frustration of the families. The problem is that we do not have enough therapists to fill the posts. As I said earlier, there are considerable challenges, and the filling of the vacant posts will be my priority for quarters 1 and 2 of 2022.

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