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

I thank the Labour Party for bringing forward the motion and using their Private Members' slot, which comes around once every six weeks, to put this on the agenda. I have been finding this Private Member's motion to be one of the more difficult I have dealt with because, if I were in opposition, I would be standing alongside the Deputies and in support of them, as I did many a year. That is why, when the Minister for Health stood here earlier and spoke about the process, I really welcomed that step change and that step forward. It is a very welcome departure on this side of the House. Many Ministers stood here in the past, but we are serious and we believe in that intent.

That is the case from the top down, given last Thursday, the Tánaiste signalled it too, and only yesterday, the Taoiseach signalled it, stating:

That said, the Government will enter a process, as happened in 2019 at the Workplace Relations Commission. We anticipate getting into some process to try to sort this out once and for all.

He then doubled down on that, going on to state, “we need to get into some process to get the issues resolved for these organisations”. There was reference to the Tánaiste's comments earlier, while my colleague the senior Minister spoke about the process earlier during this debate. That is from the highest office in the Department of Health.

Other Departments need to be part of it as well, given many of the Deputies who spoke earlier referred to our community and voluntary workers, not just those within health. There are many more than just us. A total of 84,000 people work in this space and each one of them is valued and respected. In response to Deputy Harkin’s point, I want them to know their work matters. We are dependent on their work and that is why this process needs to begin. The phrase "14 years" slips off the tongue easily but it is far too long not to have proper recognition within a process. When we talk about people in that space, the data show there are 32,841 organisations. The sector includes approximately 2,886 entities and there are 83,714 members of staff, of whom the lion's share work in disability, where more than 27,000 people are section 39 workers.

I acknowledge what Deputy Sherlock said about the creation of the children's disability network teams, CDNTs, in itself, having created an inequality in the staff room, and I want to address that through the process with my colleagues. While the figure of €100 million might be bandied around without enough clarity, that is where the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform supported us in our ask to acknowledge the role and the pressure section 39 workers are under. I acknowledge the fact that €100 million is a once-off measure of funding to address the autumn and winter along with the challenges of energy, food, transport and other challenges within those organisations. If that means it is pay, it will be only once off. They are separate companies. We dispense the money to the HSE and it is up to the companies to ensure these vital services the section 39 organisations provide continue to be sustainable through this difficult juncture we face. That is where the €100 million for the community nursing homes, hospices and disability teams will go, and we welcomed that once-off funding that was given within the budget.

As the Minister outlined earlier, the Government is committed to redesigning the voluntary hospice sector, which provides crucial palliative care and respite services from section 39 to section 38 status. This will help ensure that highly specialised services are more closely integrated with other HSE services. In March 2020, the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, established a cross-departmental strategic workforce advisory group in the home support and nursing home sectors. The group examined issues such as the recruitment, retention, training, pay and conditions and career development of front-line care workers to identify solutions to the challenges being experienced in the home support and nursing home sector.

It is no different to the home support issues I have in the disability sector with the delivery of personal assistant, PA, hours and home supports for persons with disabilities. This group is also engaged with key stakeholders to better understand the workforce challenges people face. Having taken stock of all the evidence, the group is currently finalising a report outlining the key findings and recommendations. Following budget 2023, the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, announced that Tusla's funding allocation will be €935 million in 2023, which is an increase of 4% on 2022. This underlines the Government's commitment to supporting Tusla and its service delivery partners.

In 2021, the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth conducted an Irish Government Economic and Evaluation Service spending review into Tusla's residential costs to identify key cost drivers. This review illustrated the agency's dependence on the voluntary sector to provide essential front-line services and the value for money and stability offered by these services.

The Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage's role with regard to homelessness is to make sure a framework of policy legislation and funding is provided to ensure housing authorities are in a position to address homelessness at a local level. To that end, a further €21 million has been secured for homeless services to bring that funding up to €215 million.

I have comprehensively addressed where we want the direction of travel to go. We are not opposing the Labour Party motion in any way whatsoever. We want to work with all Members. Everybody in this House has a story and a connection with people who fall into that cohort of 82,000 people. We need to ensure we create that process. As one of our colleagues said, we cannot have motion after motion; it is now time for action. It is time to get that process under way. Let us see with all our partners in this space how we can create the process with a direction of travel and associated timelines. At the end of the day, we want fairness, equity, respect and value. That is what I, along with my colleague, the Minister for Health, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, with the support of the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Michael McGrath, and the Taoiseach, who made a commitment in the past 24 hours, will deliver. It is time now to engage in the process.

I thank the Labour Party for giving us the opportunity to set out our stall. There is more that we need to bring to the process, however. I have no doubt that the Labour Party will hold us to account, as I will hold my senior Cabinet Ministers to account on that process. I have 27,000 people in the disability sector without whom I cannot operate and on who I am dependent to deliver health and social care services in all our communities right across the country. I am delighted that with the support of the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, Deputy O'Gorman and Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Humphreys, we will have a cross-Government, cross-party solution to this process, and we will deliver that to the 82,000 people on whose behalf the Labour Party has tabled this motion today. It has given us the opportunity to start forward from today.

See this speech in context