Pauline Tully
Cultural and Educational Panel · Sinn Féin · Ireland
“I acknowledge that there have been huge improvements on what is available for women, compared with a few years ago when there was nothing, but still far too often conditions affecting women are seen as a specialty or mystery when there is a range of supports and advice that women could receive through primary and community care services.”
“Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire chuig an Seanad. I welcome the Bill. We will be fully supporting it. It makes sense. It will reduce barriers for women and make access to contraception easier, which is always going to be welcome. It will also ease pressure on primary care.”
“We need to look at a better public transport system, especially looking after our older people in isolated communities. Even to support our rural pub, we need to look at some sort of incentive for a taxi service that is affordable for people, so we can maintain our rural pubs and look after our older people.”
“Community and voluntary services on the ground, which are vital for providing supports and services to many sectors of the community, including older people and younger people, are not seeing sufficient funding to help them to keep running, to recruit and retain staff within the youth sector, for example, to maintain buildings if they hav…”
“The motion that we have put forward is very broad and covers many aspects that affect us in rural life. I too am astounded by the amendment tabled by the Government because it does not call for anything, which gives the impression that everything that is needed is there, yet many colleagues across the room here ask for more gardaí in thei…”
“Sláintecare is being rolled out too slowly, so we need to see proper resourcing of community healthcare. It avoids people ending up in acute healthcare settings, which are overcrowded. I see a dangerous trend where many people are being referred from areas such as Cavan and Monaghan to Dublin for acute care.”
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“That was all abandoned when the recession came. There is talk of it again now and it is back on the agenda, but God knows at what cost. There was a cost to initially planning it before it had to be abandoned. All the costs have accumulated again and we are still talking about another five, six or seven years before we see the end result. There is quite a considerable piece of land just outside Virginia. It would be perfect for industrial development but cannot be developed because of the transport infrastructure. That has been said. It has been sitting there for years. It would bring much-needed employment into an area that is very dependent on agriculture mainly and on small industry as well. There is no clear mass of investment.”
“We are talking about balanced regional development, but it is anything but balanced. I come from Cavan, a Border county that is a part of the northern and western region of Ireland, which is ranked No. 218 out of 234 EU regions in terms of transport infrastructure. Cavan, Monaghan and Donegal have no rail service. They did 65 years ago but all was stopped by a Government that had absolutely no foresight in favour of a lobby by car manufacturers to get people into cars. Even the road infrastructure is very poor. The M3, which comes from Dublin towards Cavan, stops at the Meath border and does not go into Cavan, causing a bottleneck at Virginia several times a day every day. There was talk more than 20 years ago of a Virginia bypass. I was a member of Cavan County Council at the time and we talked about preferred routes.”
“They feel this is necessary to help them and help the students to learn. They do not know how to deal with students who have complex needs. I would like to see inclusive education but that cannot happen until supports for children and staff are in place and all staff are trained to teach in special education settings.”
“Early intervention is key. Many students are either non-verbal or pre-verbal going into schools. They are not getting the early intervention students were getting from the intervention teams some years ago. They are not getting it from the children's disability network teams, CDNTs. That is leading to huge problems where there is a lack of ability to communicate. It is leading to frustration. In some cases, it is leading to self-harm or to children causing injuries to other pupils and staff and to school placements regularly breaking down. We need to find out how we can ensure every child receives an appropriate education with the appropriate supports. I know from talking to a number of primary schools that they would love to see the Minister rolling out therapies in schools, an issue she has spoken about.”
“The same should happen in primary school education where the focus should be more on oral skills. Special education is obviously a big issue. We had more than 120 students with no school placement at the beginning of the school term last year. I know many of them have received school placements since then. We also have a lot of students who might have a school placement but it is not necessarily an appropriate one or it may not be in their community. I know there has been considerable investment in special education, but we need to look at how we make education more inclusive for all so that students with additional needs can attend their local school with their siblings, where possible, or attend a school in their community, if at all possible, instead of having to travel up to an hour to receive the appropriate education.”
“The focus in our schools seems to be wrong because it is almost all on the written element. In secondary school especially, it is about passing an exam. I did not teach Irish but I had situations where students just wanted to be able to write the language. They did not even know what the words meant once they could string the sentence together on a page. I did French in school for five years and at the end of that time, I was not great at conversation in French either. I do not think I would have headed off to France and been able to engage with French people. Maybe we need to look at how we teach languages other than English in our schools, but particularly our national language. We learn to speak a language by immersion in it, by talking to others and listening to our parents and others around us as children.”
“She did immense work with students who may have had mental health issues or may have been self-harming. Unfortunately, her position and other positions were gone after austerity. I would like to see investment in the school completion programme because it has a huge part to play in ensuring that students from disadvantaged backgrounds, including Traveller backgrounds, stay in school longer. The benefits they reap from that will be seen in later years. I concur with the previous speaker on Irish language education. Most of us spend 13 or 14 years in the Irish education system and when we come out of the school we cannot string together a conversation in Irish. There is huge interest at the moment among young Irish people in learning and speaking the language.”
“There are criteria. Could this be looked at again to ensure that all schools are assessed in all areas? I would like the Minister to expand on the DEIS plus scheme. Does it provide additional supports to schools that already have DEIS status or will it include more schools that currently do not have DEIS status in the DEIS programme? As part of the DEIS programme, the school completion programme is excellent. The cuts to that programme after austerity had a huge impact. I recall teaching in the early 2000s during what we called the Celtic tiger period. The school completion programme had significant funds and could therefore employ a number of people to work in the school. One of the people employed in the school I worked in was a school counsellor.”
“The school I taught in had DEIS status, so I know the benefits of DEIS in schools that have significant disadvantage. However, I am dealing with a school in one town where there are four primary schools. Three of them have DEIS status and one does not. They feel it puts them at a huge disadvantage to the other schools, and they do not understand why they are not deemed eligible for DEIS funding when students attending the school come from the same area as the students attending the other schools. I know there are different criteria, one of which is homelessness. The school would say it has families who are homeless, but they are not registered as homeless because they are maybe living with family in the box room or sleeping on the sofa. There is also a stigma attached to registering as homeless so people do not want to do it.”
“If a student enters the school after that date, the school does not receive any money for that student for the school year. There are different reasons for a student coming to a school. They may need to leave one school because of certain issues and have to go to another. They may move into a different area. They may come from a different country. It means the school does not receive the money. It also affects the school book grants in that they do not receive the money for those and have to go looking for it. That can sometimes be a complicated process and they have to wait a long time. It should be that when students move or join a school the capitation can be drawn down for that student even if it is a few months into the school year.”
“The INTO addressed this issue in its pre-budget submission. It asked for a reduction in class size by one to 19. That would make an immense difference. From teaching a class of 30 and a class of 15, I know the amount of work you can do with students is immense. We want to see more mixed ability teaching in our schools. If you have students with additional needs or from another country with language difficulties, the amount of time you can spend with them when the class size is small compared with a large class size is immense. It makes a huge difference to them and ensures that we have an inclusive education system. On capitation, I also raise an issue that has been raised with me by schools. The capitation grant is paid depending on the number of students registered in a school on 30 September on the primary online database, POD.”
“As the previous speaker mentioned, our investment in education is still considerably below the OECD average. According to a report last year, which I acknowledge was based on 2021 figures, the average investment was 5.7% of GDP across the OECD area. Our figure was only 2.8% at that time. We were last out of 34 countries, and we are seen as a wealthy country. We need to invest in our education system. It is really important. That additional investment means the capitation grant could be increased. It means that the basic utility bills like heat and light that some schools find difficult to pay could be paid without worrying or putting pressure on parents to make contributions to the school that they can ill afford. It would also make a difference in class sizes, given they are above the average in both the EU and the OECD.”
“I was not expecting to be next. As a former teacher, I am delighted to speak on this issue. I was a teacher for nearly 30 years and most of that time was spent in Breifne College in Cavan town. I am proud of my teaching career, our education system and the good work teachers, SNAs and the whole school staff, including secretaries and caretakers, put into making our schools not only good places to learn the academic subjects, but also to develop young peoples' social skills, which is almost as important as the former. To make it a world-class system, though, a number of steps must be taken. While there has been considerable investment and good work has been done over the past number of years and we can easily see that improvement, there are still some issues that need to be addressed.”
“Many schools are not going to open in August if this strike goes ahead because teachers and SNAs will not cross the picket line. Even if they do, the schools will not function without secretaries and caretakers. I ask that the Minister for education and, more importantly, the Minister for public expenditure, resolve this dispute. They have over two months to do so before the strike goes ahead. I urge them to resolve the issues and engage with Fórsa to get a resolution as quickly as possible.”
“The trade union Fórsa represents over 2,300 school secretaries and approximately 500 caretakers. It recently held a ballot, which closed at 12 noon yesterday, on whether to take indefinite strike action. Some 81% of the members took part in that ballot, 98% of whom voted in favour of indefinite strike action. It was practically unanimous. That is due to start on 28 August to coincide with the start of the new school year. This matter relates to pension provision under the single public service pension scheme, which is being denied to them, even though standardisation of pay was granted to school secretaries in 2023 and will be granted to school caretakers later this year. I taught in a school for many years and know the work that secretaries and caretakers do in schools. Schools would not function without them.”
“Many of them were already grieving, and then to be put into an institution where they suffered further abuse, be it physical, psychological or sexual abuse, was dreadful. My heart goes out to everybody who has been affected. Sometimes we forget about the children who suffered extreme physical abuse in our day schools as well. There were horrific stories told last year. I have talked to individuals, and they recalled that. What happened was horrendous. I know there is a different process for that but just to mention them here.”
“There has been evidence of them trying to hide money and assets, which is abhorrent. Pressure should be brought to bear on all the religious institutions to pay a contribution. I acknowledge others like those who were boarded out. I know people in my community who were boarded out as children to families. My parents knew lots of others who were boarded out at the time. It was a common practice when they were young. They said while some families looked after those children very well, many did not and they were treated like slaves. It is unfortunate that they are being ignored in every sort of support that has been provided. That needs to change. Think of the children who for whatever reason ended up in residential institutions, sometimes because of a bereavement in the family or sometimes for other reasons. Those children were vulnerable.”
“We should open up more supports for families rather than just the individual. On housing supports, anyone who has endured such treatment as a child should never face the added trauma of possibly becoming homeless. Priority needs to be given to people who have survived institutional abuse to get priority for housing supports within our social housing system. That is vital. Senator Boyhan raised the point of money from religious institutions. Some money has been paid over but it has not been sufficient. I do not think every institution has paid it. It should be sought from those institutions. I recognise that the State bears a responsibility because it allowed these institutions to care for the children without proper monitoring but those within the institutions need to bear responsibility also.”
“I would ask the Department of education to liaise with the UK’s Department for Work and Pensions to ensure that any person living in Britain who is eligible for support because of institutional abuse is not affected by having his or her payments means tested against this support. That is vital. This was already done for those who live north of the Border. I recognise that the enhanced medical card is a medical card without review or means test, which is important. However, many people were traumatised by what happened to them and are still traumatised, so it could be widened to include specialised trauma-related therapy to help people deal with the trauma. This would recognise that it is intergenerational, too, in that that if a parent suffered this trauma, it will have affected his or her children and possibly their children as well.”
“Having suffered such abuse as young people in institutions like these, they will suffer the double abuse of being ignored when it comes to receiving support. The one-off payment for those living overseas of €3,000 is not sufficient either. There is a rising cost of living. The payment could be linked to inflation. If the figure of €3,000 is built into legislation and does not change, it will have less impact as time goes by. That should be re-examined to see if it could be increased and linked to inflation. We need to recognise that approximately a third of those who will qualify for supports live in Britain. Liam Conlon MP introduced Philomena’s law in the House of Commons in Westminster in March. It is progressing now.”
“I acknowledge that the Bill goes quite some way to providing adequate supports for survivors but there are aspects of the Bill that are unfortunate. It excludes certain people. We know the Residential Institutions Redress Board was limited to 139 institutions, so there were some institutions that were excluded at the time, but there were also people within those 139 institutions who did not apply for redress because they did not understand exactly what the redress was for. At the time, we did not have an organisation like Sage Advocacy to help and support people to apply for the supports to which they were entitled. I welcome the fact that Sage Advocacy is there. Unfortunately, though, there are people who have been excluded for different reasons but who require support. It is retraumatising for them to be omitted from this.”
“I will be sharing time with Senator Nicole Ryan. I join in acknowledging Sheila O'Byrne and Catherine Coffey O'Brien in the Gallery. I acknowledge the profound detrimental impact residential institutional abuse had on survivors, not only at the time but right up to the modern day. I also join Senator Curley in acknowledging Senator Boyhan on his passionate speech today and for all his advocacy work in this area, bringing it home to us what it really means to have been a survivor of something like this. I wish to quote Ms Maeve Lewis of One in Four, who told the committee: Survivors of abuse in institutional care were abysmally failed by the Irish State in their early years. It is incumbent now on us as a society to ensure that as they age, they are afforded the highest quality appropriate services they so richly deserve.”
“The grants are very important because they allow older people and disabled people to continue living in their own homes. They reduce the possibility of accidents and prevent hospitalisation, nursing home care and the requirement for home care. It is very important that sufficient funding be given to Cavan County Council and indeed other councils that may find themselves in a similar situation to ensure they can actually process the grant applications they receive and allow people to continue to live in their own homes.”
“I received correspondence from Cavan County Council the week before last indicating its intention to temporarily pause private housing grant schemes. I refer to the housing adaptation grants for older people and disabled people, the mobility aid grants and housing aid for older people. The reason the council needs to pause the grants with immediate effect is that it has run out of funding. It has made a submission to the Department of housing seeking further funding. I support that submission today and call on the Minister for housing to provide the funding because it is very early in the year for the council to have to cease processing grants. It will continue to process grant applications with priority 1 status but fulfilling all the requests under priority 1 is also funding dependent.”
“They were very upset about it and they had no option but to live in that house even though it was not in a safe condition. They needed the money to update the electrics and so forth. I am disappointed - as other speakers are - about the Bill being pushed down the road for a year. I do not think that is necessary. Everything should be done to bring as many properties as possible back into use as residential or, if they are business properties and no longer being used as a business property, to convert them to residential.”
“Another aspect of the grant, which I also brought up with the Minister, Deputy Browne, is the number of people who bought houses to avail of the property grant and who actually qualified for it, but because they were homeless and could not afford to rent or stay in bed and breakfast accommodation, they moved into the house and then were told they no longer qualified for the vacant property grant. Is this something that could be addressed? The property was vacant for the two years or more and it qualified for the grant. They did not know they had to get the application in before they could live in the property. The property was in a poor condition, they needed the money to do it up, but suddenly they were told they did not qualify anymore.”
“We have seen a lot of houses actually brought back into use but the grant needs to be reviewed because there is a difficulty with the payments not being in stages. Perhaps that could be looked at so people do not have to get all the work done in 13 months and then pay for it all up front. It can be difficult to get that done. I have also heard recently of a number of people who had a property or house rented, and to qualify for the grant when their tenants left, they did not rent the property again. They left it lying vacant for two years so they could claim the grants. We are taking houses out of the rental market by doing that. Okay, when they do up the property it will be rented again, but I do not know how this can addressed. It is actually reducing the number of houses on the market.”
“He said that every time they went around compiling this, he would have a number of staff doing the work with him, but the next thing is the staff would be pulled away and redeployed to another section of the council and then it never got finished. He was trying to pursue this on his own and it is a very difficult job. We need to do more to try to ensure people who own derelict buildings are actually made to do something with them. Some of the buildings are in quite a dangerous condition. I have been contacted by people who are living beside derelict properties that have started to fall down. They are really concerned for their own property and for their own safety. The vacant property refurbishment grant is welcome.”
“I recall asking a person I was canvassing with were we not canvassing a particular row of houses in a town and he said there was no one living in any one of them. Those houses were in good condition but people were not renting them out or living in them and they were not willing to sell. I believe they were just holding out to try to get a better price if the housing market improved. It seems we need more incentives for people to sell. I welcome the vacant property tax but it is a self-declared tax and I do not know that it is being pursued and implemented enough. We need to do more about that. I engaged with one of the council's engineers whose duty it was to compile the register of derelict buildings in the county.”
“I am happy to speak in support of the Dereliction and Building Regeneration Bill. We are living through a housing crisis at the moment so every opportunity must be used to ensure we bring buildings of all sorts back into use for housing. I noticed the levels of vacancy in our towns and villages when I was canvassing in 2020. We saw many vacant buildings, some of them derelict, on the main streets and along all the other streets in all the towns and villages throughout Cavan. I know it is no different from any other county. Unfortunately, since that canvassing it has not actually changed. A friend of mine was a census enumerator a number of years ago and she said that, in the rural areas, there are a high number of vacant properties. According to the last census, there are more than 160,000 vacant properties throughout the country.”
“It is something that can be raised with the Minister for enterprise or the Minister for agriculture, because many times it is agricultural produce that is affected. What is happening is devaluing the goods farmers work so hard to produce. I ask that this issue be raised with both Ministers or whoever is the most relevant Minister to examine this and perhaps have a debate on it in the Chamber.”
“Tesco is taking over the lease of a SuperValu store in Virginia, County Cavan. I have been informed that all local suppliers have been told they must be prepared to give a 40% margin immediately on their goods. This is just going to hammer local suppliers. They were supplying SuperValu and, if they want to continue to supply Tesco, they have to slash their prices. They cannot afford to do that. They are already barely keeping their head above water. They have families to support, transport costs, production costs and so on. They are providing fresh meat, some of which is organically produced, and fresh fruit and vegetables. What we are seeing is a decline in the number of people who are providing that sort of food in this country because of this practice. It is time the Government introduced a ban on below cost-selling.”
“If somebody came from an area that was perceived to be a Catholic area and was therefore supposed to be nationalist or republican, every effort was made to ensure they did not get that job. It even came down to a name and the spelling of the name. We often thought about how Martin McGuinness spelled his name differently from Ken Maginnis and they were from very different backgrounds. Something like that was used. It happens all the time. We need legislation to ensure it does not continue to happen. It is disappointing that the Government has sought to delay this Bill for 12 months. I ask, as my colleagues have, that it is reconsidered.”
“I was speaking recently to a teacher and he told me that when he started out seeking jobs and applying for positions in different schools, he was staying temporarily with his sister in an area of Dublin and was using her address. He was not getting called for interviews, so he asked himself what was going on. He changed the address he was using and the next thing he was called for interviews. I am not going to say where it was but his sister's address was in an area of Dublin that had received a lot of bad press relating to poverty and deprivation. It was obvious that it was the address that was going against him being called for interviews. Things like this really do happen. If we go back to when sectarianism was rife in the North, people's addresses were used to ensure people from a certain background were given the jobs in an area.”
“I commend my colleague, Senator Chris Andrews, on introducing the Equality (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2025.. This Bill proposes to add a tenth ground of discrimination to the nine grounds that already exist. It is to prohibit discrimination on the basis of your address or your accent - your socioeconomic background. Every city or large town has areas that are associated with poverty and discrimination. There is often intergenerational poverty so it is very difficult for people to actually get out of that poverty. They need support. We know it is used against people living in particular areas within a town or a city, especially.”
“Now that they have returned, they have to wait between three and five months for a procedure that only takes a couple of days in Australia. This matter needs to be addressed.”
“I will mention a related matter, although it differs slightly from the issue of waiting times, namely, people returning from living abroad who want to transfer their driving licence to an Irish one. I have mentioned this issue before. People who want to change their driving licence from an Australian one to an Irish have been told there is a wait time of between three and five months. This means they cannot drive or get insurance for that period. That wait time is absolutely ridiculous. It only takes about two weeks in Australia to do the same task. These are people who had full Irish driving licences, went to Australia for a couple of years and transferred their licences so they could drive in Australia.”
“The mother told me her son bought the app for €15 and installed it on his phone but there is a queuing time of an hour to be notified of a cancellation. That option is not working either. I do not know why it takes a private company to do this. The RSA should inform people of cancellations and maintain a list. As a number of Senators mentioned, there are over 2,000 driving instructors in this country. They are knowledgeable as regards the rules of the road and the driving test marking scheme. With very little training, they could be asked to do tests a couple of days a week and they are willing to do so. That is one way to deal with the huge backlog in driving tests.”
“The last time there was a recruitment drive, many of those who completed the training did not take up a position. To combat that, the terms and conditions are better this time. I hope all the trainees will take up the role but there is no guarantee. Has the RSA taken into account the number of testers who will retire in the next short while? The wait time in Cavan is approximately five months. Last night, a parent contacted me and told me her son had applied in March but will not get a test until the end of August. She told me he has got a job for the summer which requires a driver's licence so he will be unable to take up that job. A private company has introduced an app that informs people of any test cancellations in an area.”
“There has been an increase in the number of unaccompanied drivers being caught by the Garda. We cannot condone driving unaccompanied but many of these people feel they have no option because they must get to their work, the location of their apprenticeship or their place of study and because they have no way of getting there, they take their chances and drive while they await a driving test. The RSA has stated it aims to recruit 200 testers but is that a sufficient number? At present, there are 130 testers and if 70 people are recruited, the number of testers will increase to 200. I understand 13 testers are in training. Will 70 testers be trained? Who is to say that when people have been trained they will take up the position?”
“As already mentioned, the waiting times for driver tests are totally unacceptable, with over 83,000 people now waiting. The number has ballooned since the beginning of the year. At the beginning of January, it stood at 72,000 and it is now over 83,000. In some centres, the number of people waiting has doubled or tripled in the last year. The RSA has stated the waiting time should be between ten and 12 weeks, so it is in breach of its own service level agreement. In 2019, the average wait time was six weeks. It is now 27.1 weeks, or almost seven months, and it is over ten months in some centres. The RSA does not seem to be planning for the future or ensuring it keeps up with the numbers because the wait lists are increasing all the time. This is badly affecting students and young adults.”
“I am not so sure, because we see what is happening in Gaza on our screens and on our phones every day, yet there is almost silence from many of the main countries across the world. In fact, Netanyahu has been emboldened in his actions by Trump. He has been encouraged by him and by other leaders. I do not know what his mindset is; it is hard to fathom. What is happening needs to stop. We must put all our voices together and call out this behaviour. We must impose sanctions and do what we can to stop this madness and get the help the people in Gaza need. Senator Stephenson has given me a list of the people killed. I have 30 children's names in front of me, none of whom reached their first birthday.”
“Some of those same countries are complicit in the genocide because they are supplying weapons to Israel on an ongoing basis and they are just ignoring the consequences of what is happening. Our Government is saying the right things, but it needs to be more forceful and must put pressure on other countries to call this out as well. We must enact the occupied territories Bill without delay. We must also stop the sale of war bonds in this country through the Central Bank. It has often been said that had the Holocaust that occurred in Germany in the 1930s and 1940s been known about, it would never have happened and people in other countries would have called it out.”
“Like other Senators, I wish to raise Israel's barbaric actions in Gaza. We have seen war crimes being committed daily for the past 19 months, with men, women and children being killed or horrifically injured. Hospitals are being bombed, medical personnel are being targeted and journalists are being killed. Tom Fletcher of the UN has said that 14,000 babies could die in the next 48 hours if vital aid supplies are not let into Gaza. There has been an 11-week blockade by Israel of essential supplies of food and medicine. This must be called out and stopped. I welcome the fact that the UK, France and Canada called it out today, but where have they and other countries been for the past 19 months in not calling it out and not imposing sanctions on Israel?”
“One parent told me about having an appointment in Cavan General Hospital in the morning and another in the afternoon at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda. That meant a whole day. The child was not in school and the parent had to take a day off work. I am asking for clarification. Is this service going to be provided in Cavan, as promised by the former Minister and indicated in the first letter I received from the RCSI Hospitals Group?”
“However, parents were telling me that this had not happened and that referrals were still required. I followed up on the issue with a further parliamentary question, asking why 24 paediatric patients from Cavan and Monaghan were still travelling to Drogheda for insulin pump therapy. I was told that the pathway had been extended but was being managed through Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda. The situation had not changed. One still had to be referred from the diabetic team in Cavan General Hospital to Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda if one wanted access to insulin pump therapy. This was important for children who were quite young and did not want to inject themselves or have their parents inject them daily. Children were meeting one team in Cavan General Hospital and another in Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda.”
“I received a letter in May 2023 stating that the service would be expanded to include the provision of insulin pump therapy to children and young people from the Cavan and Monaghan area in Cavan and Monaghan hospital. The previous pathway required onward referral from Cavan and Monaghan hospital to Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital Drogheda and Temple Street hospital. We were delighted that this treatment was earmarked to be available in quarter 3 of 2023. That quarter and the following quarter came and went and parents were still telling me that insulin pump therapy was still unavailable in Cavan and Monaghan. I submitted a parliamentary question. The reply indicated that services had been expanded to include children in Cavan and Monaghan hospital in quarter 4 of 2023.”
“Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit. This matter relates to paediatric diabetic services, specifically insulin pump services, in Cavan and Monaghan general hospital. I raised it with the previous Minister for Health, former Deputy Stephen Donnelly, in the Dáil on a number of occasions. Parents of children and young people have approached me to say that children with a diagnosis of type 1 diabetes were unable to access insulin pump therapy through Cavan General Hospital and had to be referred to Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda or Temple Street hospital in Dublin. As stated, I raised the issue with the former Minister and, in fairness, he pursued it.”
“People between the ages of 15 and 18 who are admitted to hospital through an emergency department are often not deemed suitable to go into the children's ward, but they are not adults so they cannot go into an adult mental health unit. Is provision being made?”
“Teams that would look at both of those items together were to be set up. I would love an update on those. For adults, the issues are intertwined. People with addiction issues often have mental health issues or people who have mental illness often end up drinking or taking drugs to make themselves feel better and it worsens the problem. We need to make sure our services are providing a dual diagnosis service. On eating disorders, the Minister of State indicated a number of teams have been established. Are they all operating at full capacity? Teams may be established, but if they are only operating at 50%, they are not able to assist. We need to ensure the eating disorders teams are there because it is something people can get help to recover from.”