We learned at the weekend of the resignation of Mr. Brendan Lenihan from the board of the HSE and from the chair of its audit and risk committee. His reason is the €2 billion black hole in the HSE service plan. We need to know why the Minister for Health published the HSE service plan knowing of that substantial financial risk within its pages. We need to get an assurance that services will not be cut in order to close that gap. We also need to know what will be done about the fact that there is now no accounting o…

I asked about the lack of expertise on the board.

Somebody has been appointed but that person has no expertise in this area.

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this legislation which the Social Democrats will be supporting. A ban on the sale of vapes to under 18s is very much long overdue along with curbs on advertising. However, given the surge in youth vaping, the provisions of this Bill do not go far enough to tackle what is a rapidly growing problem. During pre-legislative scrutiny, the scale of vaping amongst minors was laid bare and that is why the Committee on Health recommended greater intervention than the Minister of State i…

A related topic is the question of home care. There is a crisis in home care. While the HSE provides home care staff with proper pay and conditions, the reality is that in much of the country that essential service has been outsourced to the private sector. The people working in those services are at a serious disadvantage to those who are employed by the HSE. What are the various elements of the latest offer for home care workers in the private sector?

I would like some specifics. I set those out in the question. When the Minister of State talks about the living wage, is that €13.85 per hour, which is the current living wage? What arrangements are in place for increases to that living wage? There is a system for determining that and it is increased on an annual basis. Will the contract cover those increases? I would like confirmation of that first. What about the question of continuity of income for staff? If a client goes on holidays or is in hospital for a few …

Sorry, mileage.

My question is about mileage.

That is really disappointing. In the context of us having a crisis in home care at the moment, does the Minister of State realise 6,500 people, mainly older people have been approved for home care but services are not being provided to them? We were discussing earlier the problems of people inappropriately arriving at hospital emergency departments. A major element of that relates to older people who do not have the necessary care at home. What the Minister of State is proposing is a far cry from what was recommend…

We should reflect the reality of the situation. It is not a matter of what the Minister of State thinks. She committed to implementing the expert report that she herself commissioned. As the figures have been validated by Grant Thornton, there is no dispute about the costs. Why is the Minister of State not prepared to meet the costs of providing home care? Approximately 6,500 people are awaiting home care and that number has remained stubbornly high. Despite all those elements to which she has committed, it seems n…

Those figures are meaningless.

Says the biggest landlord in the Dáil.

That land was sold to a developer.

It is not an excuse.

Last weekend we learned that the Taoiseach's housing policy priority is homeownership. That is certainly news to me and to most people because Fine Gael's tenure in government has proven otherwise. Of course, for much of that time Fine Gael's failed policies were supported by the Minister's party. Since 2011 Fine Gael has driven a coach and four through our planning system, incentivised the wrong type of housing, rolled out the red carpet for vulture funds and, to top it all off, propped up artificially high rents …

Does he know how many permissions were granted for houses last year? What percentage of the planning permissions were for houses? It was a derisory 2%. Only 2% of all housing planning permissions in Dublin last year were for actual houses. A total of 6,290 permissions were granted but only 136 of those were for houses. There were 136 permissions for houses in the entire Dublin city area. Is it any wonder that house prices have skyrocketed? There are virtually no new houses being built in Dublin city-----

-----and therefore almost none to buy. Of course, all of this has happened not by accident but by design. That is why, as far as so many people are concerned, the Taoiseach's professed belief in homeownership rings utterly hollow. A 2021 Dublin Inquirer report revealed that between 2018 and 2020 more than half of homes granted planning permission in Dublin city were build-to-rent units and that number has only increased since. This will not come as a surprise to anyone living in the city, where the disastrous resul…

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. I thank Deputy Bríd Smith for her work on this legislation. Today marks five years since the historic referendum to repeal the eighth amendment and this Bill provides us with a fitting opportunity to reflect on the legislation passed in December 2018. Despite the largely positive implementation of the Act, a number of key issues have become apparent and these are laid bare in the review. They include the mandatory three-day waiting period, which has been descr…

I welcome the opportunity to speak about some of the underlying reasons for the stubbornly long hospital waiting lists and I thank Sinn Féin for bringing this motion forward. Reading through this motion should be a sobering experience, but the reality is we have become so accustomed to unacceptably long waiting lists with unambitious targets and missed deadlines that we are no longer shocked by those. We have reached a point where our waiting lists may be shocking but they are no longer surprising. This is because …

I move amendment No. 1: To insert the following after "replace paper-based health records without further delay": "further calls on the Government to accelerate the development of elective hospitals in Cork, Dublin and Galway; make provision for salaried GPs to strengthen out of hours services; and complete and publish the Regional Health Areas Implementation Plan". I want to talk about what I regard as an important further call on the Government to accelerate the development of elective hospitals in Cork, Dublin a…