Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy. I take on board her point about the data. I will raise it with Tusla the next time I meet with it. I meet Tusla quarterly. I assure the Deputy that workforce planning and retention are central in all my engagements with the board. These are a source of real concern for the board too. It is important to say that the number of allocated cases has come down significantly in recent years because of the applied focus of Tusla on it, but it is still too high. That is why we are taking the range of measures to which I refer in order to increase the number of college places for social workers. We need to significantly increase the number of college places for social and healthcare professionals generally. That is a source of worry for me and for the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte. We have engaged extensively with the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, Deputy Harris, and his Department. We will see some increases in places in the CAO in 2023. In successive years, we need to see and we will see the same focus on increasing numbers here as we see with doctors and nurses.

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