Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

That is wrong. There are many people out there - and I do not mean this in a patronising way - who may not have the capacity to advocate or the wherewithal to phone their local public representatives. They should not have to do that to get access to a service.

This is such a sensitive issue that one does not wish to be political or partisan about it but we are not seeing an improvement in the waiting lists, year on year. What the report of the Mental Health Commission showed us was illustrative, but it probably just crystallised our experiences, as public representatives, of mental health services. It did not tell us anything we did not already know. Many of us have been experiencing the CAMHS phenomenon for many years. I was provided with figures for waiting lists on 16 September 2022. The information was separated into people who had been waiting for an appointment for less than 12 weeks, between 12 and 26 weeks, between 26 and 39 weeks, between 39 and 52 weeks and more than 52 weeks. The total was 4,127. The figure as of 25 January was 4,293. The numbers on waiting lists are increasing. I take the point the Minister of State made that there has been a massive increase in the demand for services and that the number of appointments stands at approximately 250,000. However, we are not keeping ahead of the game and ensuring that people can get through the front door, in the first instance. It has been all of our experiences that once people get in through the front door, services start to wrap around them.

Why in the name of goodness have we spent €15 million on recruitment agencies? That money has been spent by the HSE on recruitment agencies to recruit for posts that are vacant. The Ministers of State should intervene. Taxpayers are not getting a return on their investment via the HSE. We are spending €15 million on recruitment agencies to recruit for the HSE to fill the posts that need to be filled in the areas we are talking about. That needs to be looked at. We must ask where is the value for money and the return on that investment for the taxpayer. Why are these posts not being filled?

We stand in this Chamber, week in and week out, and talk about the recruitment crisis. Is there a way to level the playing field between CHOs? Where there is some capacity in one CHO, can it be transferred to another CHO where there is an acute level of need? That could be done as we compare and contrast services. We have all now moved online. God forbid, but if I were looking for an intervention tomorrow and the service I required was in Sligo, I could have an online intervention. The tools of the trade are there to make that happen. In the interim, I am asking that we make services available to people. Even if they are made available as online resources or tools to begin with, it would be a start to ensure we level the playing field for the people I represent in the Cork-Kerry region, which has already been the subject of much controversy. We do not want any more.

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