Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

As the Deputy will know, it is very important that these reviews are conducted independently. It is for that reason the chief officer is seeking a consultant from outside of Ireland to do the review in north Kerry, which is really important. My complete and utter focus at the moment is on getting the supports for the young people who need them.

The Deputy knows as well as I do that there are challenges. The post has been vacant since 2016 even though it was funded. Prior to Christmas and the publication of the report, I travelled to Tralee to meet the team there. There are some really good people working there, but there are vacancies on the multidisciplinary teams in north and south Kerry. That is the purpose of putting in place the clinical support team in Killarney. As soon as I have more details, I will revert to the Deputy. My focus at the moment is on getting the supports for those children and young adults as quickly as possible. They have suffered enough. They need the talk therapies, cognitive behavioural therapies and psychosocial supports as a matter of urgency.

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