Dan Neville (Limerick West, Fine Gael)
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Question 174: To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children the allocation from her Department for suicide prevention and research for 2005. [15463/05]

Tim O'Malley (Limerick East, Progressive Democrats)
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As the Deputy may be aware, work is well under way on the preparation of a national strategy for action on suicide prevention. The strategy, which involves the project management unit of the Health Service Executive in partnership with the national suicide review group, is supported by the Department of Health and Children. It will be action-based from the outset and will build on existing policy. All measures aimed at reducing the number of deaths by suicide will be considered in the context of the preparation of the strategy, which will be published later this year.

The Health Act 2004 provided for the Health Service Executive, which was established on 1 January 2005. Under the 2004 Act, the executive is responsible for managing and delivering, or arranging to be delivered on its behalf, health and personal social services. Therefore, it is responsible for managing suicide prevention and research programmes and allocating funding to such programmes. Accordingly, the Department of Health and Children has asked the chief executive officer of the Health Service Executive to reply directly to the Deputy about this matter.