Paddy Burke (Fine Gael)
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Senator Darragh O'Brien has the second matter. The Senator has four minutes.

Darragh O'Brien (Fianna Fail)
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Is that all?

Paddy Burke (Fine Gael)
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Yes.

Darragh O'Brien (Fianna Fail)
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I thought we had extended the time. I thank the Minister for Health for coming to the House to take this question. He is very familiar with this issue of the home help gratuity payments, and I have written to him on a number of occasions. According to my file, the first time I raised this issue was on 12 March 2013 with the Minister's predecessor and in writing to the HSE. In brief, this relates to a Labour Court recommendation that home help workers, many of whom are low paid, be granted a gratuity payment based on their years of service in lieu of pension entitlements. That was for home help services that were majority funded by the HSE. This would have a positive effect on hundreds, if not thousands, of workers throughout the country.

The issue came to my attention when two ladies in the north Dublin area, Patricia Greene and Mary Hughes, raised the matter with me, and I have pursued it ever since. The reasons we were given, which I accepted, were that while no one disagreed with the recommendation and the Government should see it through, a letter going back to 27 March 2013 stated that due to current financial constraints, the position remained the same, that is, that Government was not going to pay the gratuities due to many of these workers. They are all front-line workers but many of them are low paid, and these are significant payments.

Having been stonewalled by the former Minister, Deputy Reilly, when the Minister took over the position I got a decent answer in February of this year stating that he had initiated a review of the matter following advice from the Department's legal adviser, which would involve the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, the HSE and the Minister's own Department, and they were due to report back by the end of March this year. We are in June now. I have continued to write to the HSE and the Minister's own good offices seeking an update. Those people deserve this money. It is an entitlement in lieu of pensions and we have to let them know one way or the other whether Government will pay what is due to them. If that is not the case, it should let them know, but I will be one of those supporting them going to the courts to enforce the Labour Court recommendation.I hope we can see a resolution. I know the Minister will agree and I know that he knows the importance of home help workers across the country from his constituency and the work he does as Minister for Health. This is a Labour Court recommendation that goes back to 2009. They have been left swinging in the wind since then. They deserve to be paid and they deserve this money. I am seeking an update from the Minister today that, hopefully, has some cast-iron timelines. The Department and the Minister said that they would report back by March. I have had no advice about the conclusion of those discussions between the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and the HSE could perhaps the Minister could update me on the situation. I again thank him for taking this matter today.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Senator for raising this issue again and for his ongoing interest in the matter. It is a timely opportunity to update the House. The matter was considered by the parties at the recent public sector talks facilitated by the Labour Relations Commission at Lansdowne House. While there will always be a need for long-term residential care, older people consistently tell us that they want to be facilitated and supported to stay in their own homes and communities for as long as is possible.

The HSE will spend approximately €330 million this year on home help and home care packages. These services are provided directly by the HSE, private organisations or voluntary organisations funded by the HSE. Home help services are provided mainly by the HSE's directly employed staff. In the greater Dublin area, Wicklow and Clare, home help services are provided by voluntary providers on behalf of the HSE. These voluntary providers are funded under section 39 of the Health Act. The HSE has in place service-level agreements with these providers that set out the level of home help service to be provided for the grant to the individual organisation and requirements relating to standards of care.

As the home helps employed by these section 39 organisations are not HSE employees, the HSE does not determine the salaries or other terms and conditions to apply to these staff, including pension arrangements. Accordingly, such arrangements offered by individual providers will vary. The pay and superannuation terms and conditions of the staff concerned are not subject to the control of the Department of Health and they are not classified as public servants. The granting of any pension entitlement in such circumstances to private or voluntary sector employees would have wide-ranging implications for the taxpayer that go well beyond home helps.

Access for home helps in voluntary organisations to a pension scheme similar to that provided for home helps in the employment of the HSE has been the subject of a number of Labour Court recommendations involving SIPTU, IMPACT and the HSE. Implementation of the Labour Court recommendation on payment of a gratuity to the home helps employed by the section 39 organisations has been hindered in recent years by the budgetary situation and is further complicated by the fact that the HSE is not the employer.

I am pleased to confirm that the issue was discussed during the recent Lansdowne Road talks and that the parties reached agreement on a process for giving formal consideration to the matter. The parties agreed to establish with immediate effect a working group to examine a number of issues, including gratuity payments for home helps. The group, while operating under the aegis of the National Joint Council, is to arrange its first meeting within four weeks and is scheduled to conclude its business by 30 September 2015.

Darragh O'Brien (Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Minister for the update. I note that 30 September 2015 is the end date for reporting. I am glad it is included in the process. However, I am again disappointed that it is effectively a further delay. We were told that we would have a report by the end of March. Obviously, nothing has happened with that. I am at a loss. I will write separately again to see whether anything came from the discussions from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform and the HSE. If that was the establishment of another group to agree the process, I think we have enough information to know that the State has a liability here and should uphold the Labour Court recommendation and pay these moneys. If it is the case that this can be done before 30 September 2015, in the context of waiting for so long, that would be broadly welcome. I will be keeping a close eye on this situation. I thank the Minister for his response. I will assess it and come back to him about it.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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It is like many outstanding industrial relations issues in health and other sectors that were parked and truncated into the talks on the Lansdowne House agreement. Some were resolved and some were not resolved. For those that were not resolved, a process was agreed to resolve them in the next couple of months. I am confident that we will have a resolution or at least a decision on resolution by the end of September this year.