Disability Services
Dail Éireann — 2026-07-08
============================================================

Emer Higgins (FG), Dublin Mid-West

I thank the Deputies very much. I fully appreciate not just their frustrations but those of the parents and children they are here representing. I am pleased to be able to say that we are making progress when it comes to recruitment. The HSE reported a 28% increase in staffing levels nationwide from October 2023 to October 2025. That equates to 448 whole-time equivalents now working in HSE disability services. That includes an additional 321 who are specifically health and social care professionals. We are doing a lot of work to increase that pipeline to be able to hire from. One example of this is the student sponsorship programme, which we launched in April of last year. That has already resulted in more than 40 graduates taking up roles in our CDNTs nationally. This includes six student sponsorships across integrated healthcare area, IHA, Carlow, Kilkenny and south Tipperary and IHA Wexford and Waterford. Therefore, the Deputies will see even in their own areas that this is an initiative that is working to help support their constituents. In addition, a dedicated disability workforce strategy is being developed by the HSE this year to meet growing service demands and address recruitment and retention challenges. While challenges do remain, both the Government, the HSE and our funded service providers - our section 38 and section 39 organisations - remain absolutely committed to improving access to disability services, strengthening workforce capacity and ensuring that children with disabilities and their families receive the supports they need.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-07-08/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:07+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-07-08