Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

That is good. There are also a number of other recommendations we are continuing to work on.

Deputy Bacik raised the issue of the expansion of GP care. This year, the Government took the decision to expand through income quite substantially thresholds the number of GP care medical cards for access to GPs.

That will be quite substantial, with hundreds of thousands more. We are not abandoning the over-sevens but I believe we have to re-look at how we do it. Invariably, what happens is that an announcement is made in the budget in respect of children, and it then gets into negotiations with the organisations and it is about leveraging funding from the Government. That is not an ideal way of doing it. Income thresholds were an original view within the Department of Health for a long time, but we are not abandoning this. We provided for an extension in legislation for the over-sevens and the Minister will continue to pursue that in the time ahead. The focus and the allocation this year is in respect of the expansion of GP care to those on medium incomes.

The Deputy also raised the issue of the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre and its multi-annual funding. Again, there should be a base minimum and at least an understanding of a floor below which multi-annual funding does not drop in respect of organisations that are providing an ongoing service, such as those at the rape crisis centres across the country.

Deputy Aindrias Moynihan raised a fair point in respect of the recruitment process. The HSE is saying that over the past two years, certainly since the onset of Covid, approximately 15,000 people have been recruited, which is the largest ever number but there are issues. In homecare, we dramatically increased the number of hours up to 20 million and we now want to go to 24 million homecare hours, which is dramatic compared to where it was two years ago, and that has put a strain on the attempt to get people in. I also worry about therapists and the capacity, for example, to recruit therapists in paediatrics, which has been a big concern of mine. The HSE needs to focus on making sure it can attract therapists into working with children in specific areas, as well as in the areas of mental health, psychiatry and so on, where there are also difficulties with recruitment.

Deputy Paul Murphy raised the issue of statutory sick pay. It has not been delayed. It was always going to be 1 January and the Tánaiste made that clear from the outset. He was not in a position to bring it in before then because of a range of issues in notifying people and the processes that had to be gone through.

With regard to Deputy Boyd Barrett's point, again, the measures are designed to deal with those most in need. We have provided a vast range of supports.

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