Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute on this important issue and I thank the Government for acceding to the Regional Group’s request for this debate.

The report sets out a large number of issues and is a damning indictment of the services, which are putting children’s safety at risk. It is clear that poor clinical governance is a national issue across the health system. This is an interim report rather than the full report, but it highlights failures in the management of risk, the recruitment of key staff and the provision of standardised care across the mental health system. It is important that we adhere to the report and put in place the actions required. I heard the Minister on radio this morning. He spoke about consultation, speaking to someone and so on. To be honest, the time for talking is over. We need action, and the first action must be the recruitment of an assistant director of youth mental health services, as promised by the HSE. This post is needed and filling it should not take another nine months. It should be filled swiftly. Of course, rather than an assistant director, there needs to be a full national director of mental health services who reports to the CEO of the HSE so that there is someone who is accountable to the CEO and the Minister for what is happening and who ensures that everything is carried out as expected.

The report highlights the urgent need to reform the Mental Health Act 2001 to ensure that children’s rights are adequately protected when they need mental health services.

It is damning that €11.4 million of the €24 million allocated in budget 2022 went unspent. This funding was provided to make additional investments in the service. According to a survey carried out by nursing staff, there was a shortage of 700 mental health nurses as of November. This is cause for concern. According to the survey conducted across all CHOs, 4,000 children were on waiting lists as of October.

That is an alarming fact. The HSE has still not published either its prescribing audit or the compliance with the CAMHS operational guidelines 2019 audit, which it had promised to publish in quarter 4 of last year. This is another indication, I believe, that a lot of lip service is being paid to the problems that are there.

We cannot dilute this report. We cannot make allowances for the report. This report is telling us to get up and get going with what needs to be done. We do not need any more reports. We do not need any more working groups. We do not want any more bringing together of people to discuss what has to be done. The report is the template and what we need to do is have the courage to make sure that it is implemented.

From my reading of the report, I believe that we as politicians over the years have allowed this service to fail. This is to blame not Government, but politicians.

At the outset, both the Minister, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, and the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, praised the staff. While I concur wholeheartedly, we also must do something else; we have to apologise to the staff for not giving them the back-up they need to carry out their duties. I will publicly say that this evening. As a politician, I apologise to the staff who are trying to do a job without the services and without the back-up, note-taking and so on.

One will ask, what are we to do? We have a report; let us get the action done.

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