James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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Question 212: To ask the Minister for Health and Children if there is a scheme in place which provides for Health Service Executive staff to train or retrain as nurses while in receipt of salary support; if so, the number of people who have availed of the scheme; the budget for same; the amount expended on it in the past five years; her views on whether the scheme should continue in view of the fact that nurse graduates are being trained who when qualified have no job opportunities and have to emigrate to source job opportunities; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [27221/09]

Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)
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I assume that the Deputy is referring to the sponsorship scheme which provides for public health service employees to train as nurses. This scheme was introduced in 2002 on commencement of the undergraduate nursing degree programme.

On the introduction of this degree programme, an interdepartmental steering committee saw considerable merit in introducing a sponsorship scheme specifically for suitable employees of the health service (such as health care assistants and other non-nursing grades) who wished to train as nurses. Under the scheme employees who successfully apply for sponsorship are allowed to retain their existing salaries throughout the four years of the degree programme in return for a commitment to work as nurses for their employer for a period of five years following registration.

The following is the information requested by the Deputy in respect of the past five years:

It should be noted that a quota of places on the undergraduate nursing degree programme is allocated to mature code applicants and the sponsored students are selected from this group. I support this sponsorship scheme which provides a new career development path for health service employees, many of whom are already involved in the delivery of care under the supervision of nurses.

My Department, in co-operation with the Health Service Executive is initiating a strategic review of the undergraduate nursing degree programme. This study will review the arrangements currently in place for the General, Psychiatric and Intellectual Disability undergraduate nursing degree programmes and will have particular regard to the appropriateness of the existing number of allocated student places within the context of national and local employment trends having regard to workforce planning needs to ensure that there are sufficient numbers of nurse graduates for new patterns of service delivery. The findings of the review will provide a basis to inform decision makers on the future direction of undergraduate nursing education in Ireland.