Kilkenny TD declares 'no confidence' in HSE services

Delivery of mental health services by the HSE in Kilkenny has been damned as ‘appalling’ by a local TD.

Speaking in the Dáil, Deputy John McGuinness said “I can not say it is a service I have confidence in.”

The Kilkenny TD was addressing Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly as part of an Oireachtas focus on ‘delivering universal healthcare.’

Needed in Kilkenny, he said, is a new building to house the Department of Psychiatry, currently located at St Luke’s Hospital. While this is in a capital programme, Deputy McGuinness said it needs to be delivered rather than just talked about.

While that process is underway, he continued, the range of professionals that are necessary in any modern mental health service should be recruited. “We cannot get young children in to see child psychiatrists. It is absolutely appalling.”

The TD also urged the Minister to approve funding under the Health Act for Teac Tom. The Kilkenny charity that provides mental health support and suicide intervention currently receives no structured government funding. “This delay is putting enormous stress on the organisation, the families it serves and the individuals who go to Teac Tom for assistance,” he said.

He stressed his criticisms were not aimed at HSE staff. “It is about bureaucracy, the direction of spend, which comes through the Minister to the HSE, and the nightmare of dealing with the HSE for any individual.”

Other issues in the county, the TD said, include an “insufficient focus” on the need for services to the families of children with autism. “Much more needs to be done and greater investment is needed.”

Deputy McGuinness also highlighted problems with drug abuse and the difficulty for people to register with a GP surgery.
“Primary care is the proper way to deliver healthcare but it needs money. In Kilkenny, people who worked abroad and are now returning home cannot get a local GP to take them on. They either join the queue or are left in limbo. That does not speak to a modern dynamic country and economy. It is backward.

“If it is a case of bringing back the doctors and nurses who were trained here and giving them better wages and working conditions, so be it.”

He went on to say “the elderly in our society are being badly served by the HSE. The marginalised and those left forever on waiting lists are badly served by the HSE. I see no real plan to cut all of this down, cut out the bureaucracy and deliver the services that are being demanded.”

Deputy McGuinness told the minister that “until such time as the services are delivered, I will not be able to say we have a functioning, efficient health service.”