Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I know the Senator’s commitment and hard work and that he is very passionate about this. I concentrated in the first part of my opening statement on ambulance response performance and resourcing in the Cavan and Monaghan areas. I will now focus briefly on funding of services nationally. This Government has consistently committed to investing in the NAS in recent years. The total allocation for the NAS this year alone will be €285 million, representing a significant increase on the previous year. The allocation this year includes €8 million for new service deployments, converting to €16 million in 2026, delivering up to 180 additional posts. These posts will support capacity building in our front-line emergency services, the continued expansion of alternative care pathways and help further development of specialist services, such as aeromedical services and critical care retrieval services. Through continued investment in recent years, the NAS has made considerable progress in implementing an ambitious programme of reform, transforming from what was a traditional emergency response service into a quick emergency medical response.

I apologise that I will not get to say everything I want, but I assure the Senator of the continued commitment of the Minister, Deputy MacNeill, her Department and ourselves and that we are working seriously on what we can do and in terms of the investment going into this. I ask the Senator to come back to me if this has not been answered adequately for him.