Seanad:It was quite appalling that the Department of Education had not appointed educational psychologists even though it had, over the past four or five years, interviewed people for the post and had compiled a list of up to 50 fully qualified persons, Joe O'Toole (Ind) said.
Surely no one would argue about spending in this area when the State had got €10 billion in revenue last month. Last Monday's RTÉ Prime Time programme had shown the plight of children who were suffering in this regard. Parents were having to cope with these youngsters or they were struggling in school or queuing outside some consultant's waiting room.
It was appalling that this state of affairs should be allowed to continue. He had found the programme very troubling and he had found comments by the Minister of State responsible, Tim O'Malley, beyond belief. "The fact is that he is trying to shoulder the blame on to consultants".
Kathleen O'Meara (Lab) said the Minister should resign because his response to this very serious issue, of which he had been aware, had been nothing short of scandalous. He should also leave office because of his ham-fisted attempt to cover up his ineffectiveness with his extraordinary charge that professionals working in the system were deliberately creating waiting lists.
Brian Hayes, Fine Gael leader in the House, said the shocking and disturbing TV programme had highlighted the extent of child and adolescent health problems in the country. The worst possible fact to come from the programme had been the outrageous allegation by the Minister that some people liked to have long waiting lists as it made them look powerful.
Frank Feighan (FG) said they should ask the Minister for Health to explain where the regulators were, the people who were working within the system. "Because for too long we have been relying on Prime Time to expose these awful situations."
Jim Walsh (FF) said it was ironic that at a time of tremendous affluence we appeared to have a much greater problem in the mental health area than we had in times of abject poverty.
House leader Mary O'Rourke said she thought the Minister had meant to say that the waiting list was a month in one area and five years in another and he did not see why this was so.