Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am glad to have the opportunity to contribute and I thank Sinn Féin for introducing this Bill. The report shows that waiting times for an appointment were between 80 and 200 days in some CHO areas. A 60-day wait for suicidal intent services is damning. Children went without proper monitoring while on anti-psychotic medicine and children were lost when transitioning from CAMHS to adult services. Budget after budget has failed to fund CAMHS. Multi-annual budgets are needed. The morale of staff is low and they need support. All of the staff in CAMHS are doing their best but they are not being supported by Government policy.

We all now know what happened in south Kerry and north Kerry and the way young people were let down badly by the HSE’s services. A junior doctor was blamed for mistreating many youngsters, some of whose lives have been changed forever, but then we found out that the same thing had happened in north Kerry. Where was the oversight of services? What has changed since then? Clearly, these children were mistreated. They were maltreated and let down. Their parents and families watched them deteriorate in front of their eyes, pumping stuff into them with no real knowledge of what, if anything, it would do for them.

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