Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

While we need to keep going, what has been done this year? A number of community healthcare organisations, CHOs, have already run recruitment initiatives to fill the vacancies that exist. Vacancies equivalent to approximately 72 whole-time equivalent staff have been filled so far this year. That is very welcome progress. The HSE dental service recently held a recruitment event. It invited dentists who are registered or entitled to be registered with the Dental Council of Ireland. I am delighted to say that the event was well attended by dentists who were expressing an interest in these public service jobs, which is where we need them. So far this year, there has been a net increase of 72. We are going to continue to push on that. We have sanctioned more roles because, as the Deputy quite rightly says, we need to build up the workforce. The Irish Dental Association is correct that we need significant additional numbers in the public service provision.

See this speech in context