An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business
Seanad Éireann — 2026-03-25
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Maria McCormack (SF), Labour Panel

I wish to raise the ongoing issue faced by newly qualified paramedics in terms of the National Ambulance Service. We saw them striking outside Leinster House. I spoke about this here a couple of weeks ago. There is widespread reporting on and engagement from paramedics across the country who, for the first time, were not automatically offered permanent contracts upon the completion of their training. This breaks with long-established practice. There is some movement on the permanent contracts but the reality on the ground is very different. The paramedics are still facing significant uncertainty. I have been contacted directly by many of them but I will just talk about one man who reached out to me yesterday. He outlined that he may now be assigned to a station a considerable distance from his home, with no clarity in advance. Most concerningly, he was told that if he declined such a placement, he risked the non-renewal of his temporary contract. This newly qualified paramedic was after putting his life and soul into training. Paramedics are the front-line workers in our community. The man in question was told that if he did not head so many hundred miles down the road, he might not get the contract. This is totally unacceptable. In this Chamber, we need to ask the Minister and HSE to urgently provide clarity on the guarantee of permanent contracts for all graduates, transparency on how locations are assigned, and assurances that no paramedic will be penalised for being unable to accept an unreasonable posting. If we continue like this, we are not just risking morale but also risking losing paramedics from a service that is already at breaking point.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-03-25/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:46+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-03-25