Duncan Smith (Dublin Fingal, Labour)
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374. To ask the Minister for Health if his Department has agreed an increased cost with voluntary and private homecare providers to ensure all operators who provide homecare procured by the HSE can pay mileage and travel costs to carers as recommended by the Cross Departmental Strategic Workforce Advisory Group; the estimated increased cost to his Department; if the additional funding will be provided to allow these payments be made under the HSE's procurement of home care from voluntary and private sector; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [7809/23]

Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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The Government is committed to addressing the shortage of care workers as a priority. To this end, the Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People, Mary Butler, T.D., established the cross-departmental Strategic Workforce Advisory Group in March 2022. Working closely with key stakeholders, the Advisory Group examined, and formulated recommendations to address, the recruitment and retention challenges in frontline carer roles in the home support and long-term residential care sectors. The Report of the Strategic Workforce Advisory Group on Home Carers and Nursing Home Healthcare Assistants was published in October 2022.

Providing an overview of the work of the Advisory Group and its key findings, the report presents a suite of 16 recommendations spanning the areas of recruitment, pay and conditions of employment, barriers to employment, training and professional development, sectoral reform, and monitoring and implementation.

Minister Butler strongly endorses these recommendations and they are being progressed through a dedicated implementation group. Implementation has commenced and it is envisaged that the implementation group will meet quarterly and publish an implementation plan, and progress reports thereafter.

Recommendation 9 has already been implemented with the announcement by the Government on 16th December of the authorisation of 1,000 employment permits for non-EU/EEA home support workers.

Some recommendations including those concerning travel are linked to the home support tender. The existing tender has been extended by the HSE. The process of developing the new tender is underway. It is envisaged a new tender will be finalised by April 30th, 2023. No final decisions on the tender content have been reached.