Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senator for raising this topic and for giving me the opportunity to engage with him on it. To put it in context, we are talking specifically of community healthcare organisation, CHO, 7, which covers the Senator's Kildare-Athy region, the surrounds of Maynooth and reaches as far as areas of Dublin.

It is important for me to be honest and transparent with the Senator. I thank him for raising the issues of the two families. The Senator is after getting a script but I need to correct something on it. It states "CHO 7 currently reports 1,320". Thankfully, Noel in my office kept digging until we got the actual figure so that I could give the Senator real openness and transparency on it. The figure is 2,665. That is the number of families in CHO 7 awaiting an assessment of need. That is Groundhog Day. That is as bad as it can get. To be honest, the HSE has not kept pace with the growth in population as shown in the census returns. Funding has not kept pace with disability sector and the growing population. It is important to say that.

As for what I will do as Minister of State to address that, because 2,665 families are waiting for an assessment of need which will open many chapters, be it in education, domiciliary supports or whatever, in working with the HSE I am looking at putting in place a number of regional teams. At a local level, I have to complement Ms Deborah Jacob, and I complement my leads in that area, namely, Stewarts Care and the Central Remedial Clinic. They work very hard with Ms Jacob in ensuring what can be delivered under the Progressing Disability Services for Children and Young People, PDS, programme and the assessment of needs can be done.

However, there is a legacy piece to do with the preliminary team assessment, PTAs. It also requires us to address the High Court ruling. I have received the report on it from the HSE. I have sent it to the legal department in the HSE for its independent advice on it before we make a final decision because what was in the past did not work. The PTA, which was there when we came into office, did not work and we need to be not unsure about the next step.

When I have the final report back within a number of days, my suggestion is to put in place six regional teams to match the regional health areas, RHAs. I was fortunate in the recent budget to secure €11.5 million to address this backlog in assessment of needs. Those six regional teams will cover the various areas, so we will have a complementary team in each RHA that will specifically address assessments of needs and we will get through them. When those assessments are done, the children who need whatever supports are required will, depending on the need, either find themselves back with a primary care team or back with the children's disability network teams, CDNTs. They will have the results they can present to the Department of Education to get their educational supports.

There are three different levels to this. While it might sound complex, the flow of this will be quite seamless and it will be dependent on the staff. As opposed to putting the pressure on each single team, because we have neither the staff on the team nor the clinical governance piece to assess the risk of it, by doing six teams, each CHO manager lead, that is, the head of community health, needs to support the disability manager and work with primary care. We also need education on those RHA teams. It is the whole of the child, the child at the centre and what the child needs. That is the ambition, and sooner rather than later.