John Kelly (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I join colleagues in paying tribute to the national men's and women's rugby teams following their Six Nations victories. I pay particular tribute to Larissa Muldoon, a member of the women's team whose father went to school with me. I was glad to see there was Rossie blood on that team. I also take the opportunity to congratulate the Roscommon football team, whose members are playing out of their skins at the moment. They will have an awful job to avoid promotion.

Will the Leader agree to a debate on the future of psychiatric services? Back in the 1980s, the strategy, as set out in a document called Planning for the Future, was to establish hostels and day care centres while we still had a good community-based psychiatric service. When the elderly people concerned were no longer able to avail of those services, they were put into long-term care due to their age and conditions such as Alzheimer's disease and paranoid schizophrenia. Now the HSE is looking to move these people on. In Áras Naomh Chaoláin in Roscommon, for example, residents who have lived there for 25 to 30 years are being vetted with a view to discharging them either into the community or into the private nursing home sector. There is a serious threat hanging over the future of our day care centres and hostels. Effectively, we seem to be going down the road of privatising mental health services, and the word "care" has been taken out of any consideration when dealing with older people. That is what I am hearing from psychiatric nurses across the board. Elderly people are being tossed around like rag dolls just to save money for the HSE. It is totally unacceptable and I will not stand for it. We must have an urgent debate on the matter in this House.