Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

761. To ask the Minister for Health the cost of increasing staffing of mental health services to fully comply with numbers set out in A Vision for Change and including demographic changes since 2006. [27483/16]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

A Vision For Change, our national Mental Health Policy, was introduced in 2006. Among its recommendations were that approximately 10,650 Mental Health Whole Time Equivalents were required to fully implement the policy.

This figure was based on Ireland’s then population of 3.917 million, as indicated in the 2002 census. The population of Ireland today, based on the most recent confirmed Census figures in 2011, is 4.499 million. Taking into account this demographic change, the required number of Mental Health Whole Time Equivalents is now 12,240.

As of April 2016, there are 9,553 Mental Health Whole Time Equivalents employed, a gap of 2,687. Using an average figure of €66,000 per Whole Time Equivalent, the additional resources required to fill the gap is €177.3 million per annum.

Since 2012, €160 million in additional ring-fenced funding has been allocated to the mental health services up to the end of 2016. Taking into account various factors, the additional amount provided in the HSE National Service Plan from 2012 to 2016 inclusive totalled €115 million.