I thank everyone for being here for this debate. I appreciate the attendance of everyone who sat through the entire debate. I always look forward to coming into the Seanad to listen to the various contributions. I will try to answer as many of the questions asked as I can. It is important to note that significant investment has taken place in community organisations that provide vital early-intervention services for children. While €125 million was spent on CAMHS last year, an awful lot more money is provided from …

It is only until the end of March.

It will not be permanent.

I was here last week for a Topical Issue debate and the Deputy did not turn up.

I reiterate what my colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, said in her opening remarks and thank all Deputies for the constructive and positive contributions to this important motion on the issue of CAMHS. I thank Deputy Ward for tabling the motion. Many of the same speakers were present last Thursday evening for three hours. We are here again today for two hours. I will be in the Seanad tomorrow. I welcome any opportunity we can get to shine a spotlight on mental health. We might be on opposite sides o…

I thank the Minister for his contribution this evening and welcome all our NGO partners to the debate. I am very pleased to attend today with the Minister and I will also be in the Seanad next week. The Government is fully committed to the delivery of high-quality, person-centred and recovery-oriented mental health services. The Mental Health Commission’s interim report on the independent review of the provision of CAMHS in the State by the Inspector of Mental Health Services looks at service delivery and administr…

I want to thank everyone who has been here for over three hours. We have listened intently. That is one thing I always do whenever I sit on this side of the House. I listen and take notes. It has been a really difficult week. There is no point in saying otherwise. Deputy Niamh Smyth summed it up when she said that you should not have to fight the system. We all see that you have to fight with the system even though we have really good people working within it. In that context, Deputies Ó Murchú and Munster referred…

I thank the Deputy for raising this issue. The provision of out-of-hours GP care is a fundamental component of general practice and appropriate access to GP out-of-hours services must be maintained. Under the general medical services scheme, contracted general practitioners must make suitable arrangements to enable contact to be made with them, or a locum or deputy, for emergencies outside normal practice hours. Most choose to participate in GP out-of-hours co-operatives or other GP out-of-hours service providers t…

I thank the Deputy. Her point is well made. To reiterate, the HSE continues to work in partnership with NoWDOC and Caredoc to ensure the delivery of a safe and appropriate GP out-of-hours service. No decision has been made with regard to any redesign of the service in the area and any such decision will involve the stakeholders concerned. The HSE CHO has confirmed that there are currently no plans to move the treatment centre from Carrick-on-Shannon or to change the level of the services provided there. The Deputy …

Please God.

I thank the Deputy for his question. It has been agreed with the HSE that there will be an assistant national director specifically for the child and adolescent mental health service, CAMHS, and that recruitment will be under way in the next two weeks. I am very pleased to have agreed that. It is very important, after the report and as a result of the Maskey report last year as well, that we have this post. The post is not just going to be one person; there will be four and a half whole-time equivalents working wit…

The Government is committed to supporting the continued participation of landlords and growing their investment in the rental market. Budget 2023 provides for a doubling of the cap on deductibility for a landlord's pre-letting expenditure for previously vacant properties to €10,000 per property. The requirement for vacancy for associated expenditure to qualify for such tax deductibility has been reduced from 12 to six months. Under action 2.8 of Housing for All, the Department of Finance reviewed the recommendation…

I will relay Senator McDowell's thoughts back to the Department. The Senator has made some valid points. We know that many landlords are exiting the market. Many of these people were accidental landlords who might have inherited or bought houses.

Many of these individuals never intended to be landlords, and they find themselves in difficult circumstances at present. This can be seen throughout the country. I agree with Senator McDowell on that and on the point he made that they are not encouraged to remain within the framework of what they can really do. The review of which I spoke is already under way and will be progressed as early as possible. Any change to the Residential Tenancies Act will require careful consideration, taking into account the constitu…

I am taking this matter on behalf of the Minister for Transport. I thank the Senator for raising it, as I know he has done previously. I understand the Senator is asking that the young adult card scheme be extended to include 50% discounted journeys to colleges in Northern Ireland. The Department for Transport has responsibility for policy and overall funding in relation to public transport. However, the Department is not involved in the day-to-day operation of public transport services nationally. The NTA has stat…

I will do that.

I thank the Deputy for raising this matter and for the opportunity to update the Dáil on it. Public health nurses play an extremely valuable role within the community healthcare system and provide an extensive range of services, including the provision of child health screening and supports for parents. It is vital that the local community in Crumlin, and all communities across the country, have access to public health nurses when they need them. Their valuable role was highlighted when public health nurses, along …

To reiterate, I am pleased to confirm that the return of public health nurses to their core duties has now enabled the resumption of child development checks across the country. Last year, for example, 84% of children had the check before they reached 12 months, whereas in the previous year, in the height of Covid, the rate was sitting at 59.8%. There has been a huge increase but we want to get it to 100%. We want to make sure every child receives these vital checks, as the Deputy suggested. The role of the public …

I thank the Deputy for raising this important issue and welcome the opportunity to address the House. While acknowledging that there are significant challenges in the provision of healthcare services in Limerick and the mid-west region, there has been and continues to be substantial investment in UL Hospitals Group. For example, in October 2022 the Minister for Health broke ground on a new 96-bed inpatient block project at UHL. This capital project will deliver a four-storey, 96-single-bed acute inpatient ward bloc…

The Minister, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, the Government, along with the Department of Health, remain fully committed to improving services in Limerick, the mid-west region and across the entire country. I believe that only recently the Minister, Deputy Stephen Donnelly, and the Taoiseach, met with the elected representatives in that area. It is very clear that after what has been a very difficult couple of years for the UL Hospitals Group significant efforts are being made to ensure that issues such as delays to elec…