Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

I want to talk about the skill set of a group of workers who are doing vital work in our health service at the moment. I am referring to the 1,000 Indian nurses who came over here at the start of the year on two-year work permit programmes to work as healthcare assistants. They are not working as nurses, but as healthcare assistants in the private nursing homes in this State. I will leave aside the fact that there is a huge issue with family reunification. This State said to them that we wanted them, but did not want their kids, their partners, their husbands or anyone else coming here. This is forcing these people who are doing really difficult, stressful work in our health service to do it alone, while being separated from their kids and partners.

Leave that aside. On the question of skills, they are being told that at the end of the two years, they have to obtain QQI level 5. This is after they have been working for two years, and it is at a cost of up to €1,700 each and for a period of up to eight months, even though they already have the equivalent of a QQI level 5. In fact, their qualifications are quite a lot higher than that. They are nurses, not healthcare assistants. Why is the State forcing them to get these qualifications when they are overqualified for the position? If it is insisting on it, which it should not be, why is it forcing them to pay out of their own pockets rather than have the State pay for it itself?

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