Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats)
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2450. To ask the Minister for Health the projected expenditure on palliative care in 2022; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [37866/21]

Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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A total of €117m has been allocated in the HSE's National Service Plan 2021 for palliative care services, which represents an increase of 15.2% on the 2020 palliative care budget. The increased level of funding in 2021 demonstrates the Government's commitment to improving access to palliative care and end of life care services for people with life limiting conditions and their families.

The increased level of funding includes €7.7m for the voluntary hospice sector to address financial sustainability challenges. This means that the Government has increased the allocation for the voluntary hospice sector by €10.68m over 2020 and 2021 in recognition of the contribution of the sector to delivering high quality, accessible, palliative and end of life care.

The increased allocation also includes an additional €4m to meet the full year cost of providing an additional 55 hospice beds in locations in Mayo, Wicklow, Kildare and Waterford. The additional specialist in-patient beds have opened in all locations except Waterford, where the 20 remaining beds are expected to come on stream in September 2021. This will bring the total number of in-patient specialist palliative care beds countrywide to 268 by the end of this year.

As well as this, €2m has been allocated in 2021 to expand children’s palliative care services across the country.

In relation to projected expenditure on palliative care in 2022, as the Deputy will appreciate, I cannot comment at this stage on the outcome of the estimates process, or matters which will be the subject of national service planning in 2022.