Joe Carey (Clare, Fine Gael)
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6. To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment if he will arrange to carry out an urgent review and reform of the work permit system with a view to introducing a more effective and streamlined process to facilitate recruitment for the private and voluntary nursing homes sector given the severe challenges being experienced by private and voluntary nursing homes in terms of staffing; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [45077/22]

Joe Carey (Clare, Fine Gael)
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Will an urgent review and reform of the work permit system be carried out with a view to introducing a more effective and streamlined process to facilitate recruitment for the private and voluntary nursing home sector, given the severe challenges being experienced by private and voluntary nursing homes in respect of staffing?

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy for raising this issue, which is at the forefront of our minds as Deputies in each area trying to support those who need care in the home. Ireland's employment permits system is managed through the operation of the critical skills and ineligible occupations lists, which determine roles that are either in critically short supply or are ineligible for an employment permit. These lists undergo regular, evidence-based review, guided by relevant research, public and stakeholder consultation and the views of the economic migration interdepartmental group.

My Department chairs the economic migration interdepartmental group to oversee the review process, which includes membership drawn from senior officials of key Departments, including the Department of Health in this case. The aim of the group is to promote an integrated approach to address labour and skills shortages in the economy. This includes assessing proposals received through the public consultation for changes to the occupations lists.

We announced changes in June 2021 to assist in the shortages being experienced in private and voluntary nursing home establishments and hospital settings. These employers can now apply for the general employment permit for non-European Economic Area, EEA, nationals wishing to take up employment in the State. Since January this year, about 1,873 employment permits for healthcare assistants have been issued to more than 193 nursing homes. Therefore, this scheme is working quite well. It involves a great deal of training and upskilling as well, and an ongoing commitment to training, which will help the sector overall.

In addition, to help alleviate some of the ongoing skills shortages, we announced further changes in June this year to enhance access to employment permits for other key professional roles in the health sector. These changes included roles that may be employed in the private and voluntary nursing home sector, such as occupational therapists, physiotherapists, podiatrists and chiropodists etc. Employment in these occupations is now eligible for the critical skills employment permit, which again should help to bring more people into the sector.

Officials of my Department are now actively engaged with the Department of Health regarding recruitment challenges for the care sector. A major focus in this regard is care in the home. My Department is a member of the cross-departmental strategic workforce advisory group. It is chaired by the Department of Health, and the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, is in charge of that and tasked with considering the recruitment and retention challenges faced by the care sector. The Department continues to keep the employment permits system under review in light of changing labour market circumstances. We will respond to the advisory work group when it presents its findings. I understand it is due to report in September. We have engaged directly with the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, on this issue and she is very concerned about the shortage of talent in this area. Resulting from that, we will be able to adjust the work permit schemes, if need be, to accommodate this situation. As I said, we do have the ongoing review quite regularly. This issue was examined in the previous two reviews. There were issues around the contracts on offer and terms and conditions, and we must work on these aspects too as best we can.

Joe Carey (Clare, Fine Gael)
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I recognise the work of the Minister of State on this issue. I refer to the changes and reviews. He is a very hands-on Minister of State. I recall him facilitating a workshop with members of the Shannon Chamber of Commerce several months ago. It was very informative for the businesses that engage in the context of the work permit issue. A particular issue, however, is emerging regarding recruitment for our nursing homes sector. Basically, there is a shortage of healthcare workers in Ireland and throughout the EU. We must streamline this process.

To give an example, some of these people get their work permits, but then they must wait for the critical skills permit to come on stream after that and it may take several months to happen. Those people may also have to wait for an entry visa. More co-ordination is needed between the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, the Department of Justice and others to ensure this process can be streamlined.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy raised two important issues. The first is the reform of the overall system. In recent years, especially in working closely with the Tánaiste and the Department over the past year, we put extra resources and staffing into that area. The number of staff available to work through the backlog in permits has nearly trebled. Thankfully, the processing time has been reduced. We had been seeing timelines of nearly 20 weeks, and more in some cases. In most cases now, though, the waiting time is back down to four or five weeks, which is correct. We will continue to drive on with this work with more forms and more changes, including using IT and more skilled staff to enhance this process and to reduce the waiting time even more.

Legislation will also be coming through the Houses this autumn, which will again help to streamline the process. Therefore, the process itself is being addressed. The Deputy, however, also raised two other issues. One was our engagement and work with the Department of Justice on this issue, because it can be complicated for certain sectors and for people from certain countries coming in as well. Therefore, we have regular engagement with the Department of Justice. We have made changes that have worked quite well in the medical profession in general, and we will home in on other areas that have been identified in this regard as well. The Tánaiste, the Minister for Justice, Deputy McEntee, and I will be meeting in the next week or two to focus on some of the changes also coming through at EU level which might help us to align our two systems. We do, however, try to respond.

A working group specific to this sector, involving representatives from all the relevant Departments, has been established to focus on this issue. This has been done because this is not just about finding an answer to this problem involving work permits; other issues are involved. We must put in place permanent solutions, and I will be very happy to work with Deputy Carey to make this happen very quickly.

Joe Carey (Clare, Fine Gael)
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On that review group, when does the Minister of State expect it to report and when will its recommendations be implemented? I ask this because I can see on the ground that this is an issue now. Nursing home proprietors are contacting me regarding this issue. They have managed to get some people, but the delay in trying to process applications is what is in question here. I welcome the addition of occupational therapists and physiotherapists to the critical skills list. The important aspect, however, is to ensure people get critical skills permits in a timely fashion after they get work permits. Perhaps the two processes should happen together.

Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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We have spoken before about the operation of the work permit scheme. Streamlining is needed across the board, in respect of everything from healthcare workers to chefs. Beyond that, the Minister of State spoke about the task force. We all know the issues, whether we are talking about healthcare workers in nursing homes or home carers, which is a particular issue. The Minister of State mentioned a level of engagement with this task force. My understanding is that, to a degree, there has been some sort of draft interim review report. I imagine that is with the Government now. This is an issue we really need to be dealt with. Many families cannot get care for their loved ones at home to keep them in their homes. We know the necessity of doing this. Therefore, I would be grateful if the Minister of State could give us any update in this regard and perhaps even a preview of what is going to be proposed in the budget. We will keep it in the room.

Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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I support the other speakers on this matter. In the previous budget, €666 million was allocated to this area.

An unprecedented amount of money was committed to the home help sector but the problem over the past 12 months has been that they have not be able to fill many of these roles. They simply cannot get the people. I suggested at the Fianna Fáil think-in - this feeds in also to the Tánaiste's Ministry - that we would look in budget 2023 at special taxation which would allow people, after doing the school drop-off in the morning, to be able to provide home help in the community and be able to fulfil the school collection obligation in the afternoon without penalising that person or his or her spouse or partner from a taxation point of view. Taxation treatment here could unleash the potential of people to serve in their community, provide home care and keep people out of the acute hospital setting. I hope it can be considered by the Department and, indeed, the Department of Finance in the lead into budget 2023.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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In response to Deputy Carey, first of all, the permit regime change we made for the healthcare assistant is of major assistance to nursing homes and we work closely with them around that. Close to 2,000 permits have been issued. We have streamlined our process and we focus in, whether it be on home-care assistants or chefs, at different times of the year when there is a high priority. I think we have managed to do that, but the simple question the Deputy asked was on whether we can align that better with the Department of Justice. That is something I would agree with the Deputy on. We are trying to do that too and it is trying to focus its resources where we are to match up with the individual sectors. Nursing home care and home care are the two key areas.

We were able to make the change in the case of the healthcare assistant issue because the evidence was there. The same evidence was not there to address the shortage in the home care sector. I have engaged directly with that sector outside of the strategic advisory working group as well to hone in on the contracts that are on offer, the subsistence and the terms and conditions because the Tánaiste is very clear on this. Work has to always pay and we have to make sure that we are working with high-quality jobs here. The permit is not the solution to everything and we must see good contracts on offer that deal with all the issues concerned as well.

That advisory group, I understand, is to complete its work in September. The Minister of State at the Department of Health, Deputy Butler, is anxious that it does. We can respond to that as well.

On the third point in relation to the tax regime, we would agree that there are quite a high number of people who for whatever reason are not available to work in this country. I do not mean people who cannot work or are on social protection, but that there is a large number of people who might have retired early or have not gone back to work. We need to find new ways to unlock that potential. This is one area where there is a great deal of potential for it. That is something that is being looked at by the advisory group.