Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the the Deputy very much for that question. I am afraid to say that this is a problem all over the country and all of us have had this experience in representing our constituents, in meeting parents whose children are waiting far too long for the assessments they need and then, after that, the therapies they need. It might vary from area to area, or one community healthcare organisation, CHO, to another but it is a problem across the country and has been for quite some time now.

There are a number of aspects to it. Part of it is the difficulty in recruiting sufficient skilled staff to meet the enormous need which exists. In response to that we have dramatically increased the number of training places so that more people are trained to take up positions, particularly as therapists and psychologists. It may take a little time for that to come on stream but it will happen.

We have also introduced new assistant grades and have changed work profiles, for example, to bring more people into the service. There is a real difficulty with the assessment of need because there is a legal right not to therapies but to an assessment of need. While that was well-intentioned, it has had some unintended consequences. The courts have determined that an assessment of need is a very long process taking over 30 hours per child. That means resources that would otherwise be used to provide therapies to children is used in carrying out very long assessments of need that may not actually be necessary. That is a real problem which we have to try to work out in some way in consultation with the different NGOs and representative groups because if a child needs a particular therapy or treatment, it is often very obvious and it would be much better if they could get that right away rather than having to wait for an assessment of need which takes two or three days' work for an individual therapist.

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