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

I thank the Deputy for raising this important issue for discussion. As Minister of State with responsibility for disabilities, I want to acknowledge that is has been challenging for many stakeholders, particularly the children and young people who use the services

I again take this opportunity to reiterate my sincere regret about the delays being experienced in the provision of services. There are major challenges in recruiting and retaining staff in the healthcare sector, especially the therapy professionals required for children’s disability services. This is leading to vacant posts in CDNTs across the country. To support the effort to appropriately staff and resource CDNTs, the HSE staff census and workforce review provides invaluable data. It is the second time in a year that we have had that, so at least now I have a comparable figure. When I got it the first year, it was the first time it had ever happened. Now that I have it two years in a row, I have comparable data.

The 2022 CDNT staff census notes an average vacancy rate of 34% across CHOs nationally. However, this is to be understood in the context of an increase in approved posts. An overall analysis of the data from 2021 and 2022 demonstrates an increase of 11% in the number of posts and also a 2% increase in the CDNT workforce. I acknowledge that this is minuscule. This increase has been achieved in a context where there is an average turnover rate 9.6% in health and social care professionals in the past year. That goes to the exact point that the Deputy raised to the effect that staff are employed, find that their workload is difficult, heavy and challenging and are leaving as quickly as they are coming in. As with other areas within disability services, south-east community healthcare, SECH, in CHO 5 and community healthcare area 3 HSE mid-west in CHO 3, both of which service the requirements of County Tipperary-based children and families, are continuing to experience significant recruitment challenges. The Deputy is right. The vacancy rate for north Tipperary is 23%. It is 15% for east Limerick, 37% for Clonmel and 39% for Cashel.

The CHOs continue to progress posts out to current national panels and continues to prioritise local recruitment campaigns. However, the 2022 staff census shows some areas of improvement, with the number of therapy hours pertaining to the north Tipperary CDNT increasing by 26 % from 2021. In order to mitigate recruitment issues, the HSE is also currently taking measures nationally to encourage recruitment and retention of staff in CDNTs.

These measures include: targeted national and international recruitment, to include an agreed relocation allowance where appropriate; apprentice and sponsorship programmes for therapy grades; employment of graduates as therapy assistants as they await CORU registration; and expansion in the number of therapy assistants in the system, with the HSE supporting individuals to return to education to qualify as therapists. These measures were not in place 12 months ago. You can see the influence of the Minister in the Department in the context of the agile, pragmatic approach taken to leading and to supporting the HSE to work differently in its recruitment campaign. We need rolling recruitment campaigns, but we also need to work with the people who are here to support people to come back into education or into assistant roles. The assistant role is incredibly important. If you have a physio who writes out a six-week programme for a child and can only see the child once in six weeks or once in ten weeks, the services of assistant who can make sure that the programme is being done properly are invaluable. This is the type of post we need to put in place in our CDNTs in order that we can start to retain the staff.

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