Health (Amendment) (Home Support Providers) Bill 2025: Second Stage
Dail Éireann — 2026-01-20
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Peter 'Chap' Cleere (FF), Carlow-Kilkenny

I am delighted to get the opportunity to speak on the home support providers Bill. The Government is committed to supporting people to stay in their homes as long as possible. It is something I feel passionately about, and the Government feels passionately about. The State currently invests heavily in the provision of home support through the HSE. Home support is provided by the HSE and then indirectly through national contractual arrangements with private home support providers and not-for-profit organisations. Huge funding has gone into this area over the past number of years but there is still a huge amount of work to be done. As our population ages and more individuals prefer to stay in their homes for as long as possible, the demand for quality home care increases. However, with this demand come significant challenges we must address.
First and foremost, funding and resources are major concerns. Many home care providers struggle to secure adequate funding to meet the needs of their clients. Current Government supports often fall short, leaving both care workers and recipients in precarious situations. Many families are forced to pick up the financial burden, which can lead to stress and anxiety.
For me, the biggest challenge is the workforce shortage. Recruiting and retaining qualified home care givers is becoming increasingly difficult. In my constituency of Carlow-Kilkenny, the HSE is at full capacity in terms of what it can do on the home care side of things. It outsources to different providers but still every single week I have somebody in touch with me who has challenges. They have the hours approved and are delighted to have them approved but the workforce is not there to meet the demand. In rural Ireland in particular, this is a huge issue. I spoke with a woman recently. I will not give her exact details but she is almost 100 years of age. She was in hospital before Christmas but is back out. She has been approved for three visits per day, one hour each, for 21 visits over the course of a week. They cannot get anybody to service it.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-01-20/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:31+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-01-20