Colm Keaveney (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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136. To ask the Minister for Health further to Parliamentary Question No. 123 of 9 October 2014, if any study or report was commissioned into the impact of the delay of the full utilisation of the €35 million allocated for the development of community mental health teams in 2013, with the recruitment only commencing towards the latter part of 2013, on the health and well-being of those using the mental health services; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42399/14]

Colm Keaveney (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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137. To ask the Minister for Health further to Parliamentary Question No. 123 of 9 October 2014, the reason for the delay of the full utilisation of the €35 million allocated for the development of community mental health teams in 2013 with the recruitment only commencing towards the latter part of 2013; his views that treatment deferred in mental health services often means treatment denied to those using the mental health services; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42400/14]

Colm Keaveney (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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150. To ask the Minister for Health further to Parliamentary Question No. 123 of 9 October 2014, the reason the Health Service Executive delayed the full utilisation of the €35 million allocated for the development of community mental health teams in 2013 with the recruitment only commencing towards the latter part of 2013; if this was motivated by cost containment in the HSE; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42453/14]

Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 136, 137 and 150 together.

This Government has prioritised the reform of our mental health services in line with A Vision for Change and is committed in particular to the delivery of more and better quality care in the community.Additional funding totalling €90 million and some 1,100 new posts have been provided as part of the 2012, 2013 and 2014 Budgets, with a further €35 million to be provided next year.

In 2013, the investment of €35 million was made available to mental health services with up to 477 posts for a range of initiatives including to enhance general adult and child and adolescent mental health team provision, to develop mental health services for older people and for those with an intellectual disability, suicide prevention initiatives and forensic services. As at the end of December 2013, the recruitment process was complete for 205 or 43% of these posts. The continued implementation of the 2012 investment of €35 million ensured that, at the end of 2013, the recruitment process was complete for 391.5 WTEs or 94% of the posts allocated in 2012.

The delay in the recruitment of 2013 posts was due to a number of factors. There was no specific cost containment initiative but overall budgetary pressures within the HSE and the need to establish the type and number of posts required by each Community Mental Health Team both contributed to the delay in recruitment. In addition, there were a number of posts for which there were difficulties in identifying suitable candidates due to factors including availability of qualified candidates and geographic location. To help address these issues the HSE Service Plan 2014 committed to the streamlining of the recruitment process to allow for more local control and specialisation in respect of future appointments. In addition, a comprehensive workforce analysis was carried out, together with priorities identified by Area Mental Health Management Teams, to inform decisions as to how best to target the 2014 investment in posts.

While no study or report was specifically commissioned into the impact of the delay of the full utilisation of the €35 million in 2013, the HSE mental health management team continuously monitored and reported to me on the challenges around the recruitment process and actively managed this as part of the ongoing reconfiguration of mental health services, in line with the key multi-annual priorities in the 2014 National Service Plan. Therefore, notwithstanding the delay in achieving recruitment, progress was made during 2013 in further developing our mental health services in line with A Vision for Change, including the strengthening the Community Mental Health Teams, new clinical pathways for mental health in intellectual disability teams; delivery of 7,000 counselling sessions under the new Counselling in Primary Care initiative to 1,916 individuals, and a new e-learning suicide prevention programme for GPs.

In relation to 2014, while €20 million was provided for mental health services, the HSE National Service Plan outlined that this expenditure would be phased-in, in order for the HSE to live within the overall available resource in 2014. Accordingly, it was decided that the recruitment of 2014 posts would be commenced to provide for posts to come on stream during Q4. To this end, and informed by the analysis carried out, some 200 posts have now been identified from the 2014 allocation and the recruitment process has now commenced.