Mary Butler (Waterford, Fianna Fail)

I agree wholeheartedly. As I said, 174 is the most recent figure I received. In order for this important aspect of the Bill to work, we need sufficient authorised officers. It is hard to judge how many will be needed. Authorised officers made 16% of applications in 2023, while gardaí made 32%. This means that one sixth of applications were made by authorised officers. I agree that we cannot take an ad hoc approach to authorised officers.

On Deputy Rice's question regarding what the Mental Health Commission said, all of this will have to be worked out before the Bill can be enacted. The quicker it is worked out, the quicker the Bill will be enacted. Geography will be a major factor. If you are in the far reaches of Donegal or down in west Cork and depend on someone coming from the closest large town or city, that will not work. We cannot adopt an ad hoc approach. Everybody agrees that the officers will play an important role. There will be a role, in my opinion, for some form of full-time office in relation to them. Then there will be a hub-and-spoke approach, perhaps. I definitely agree with Deputy Clarke that the use of county boundaries will not work in this case.

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