The Minister of State has accepted that dental care, especially orthodontic care in this State, particularly that provided by the public system, is not fit-for-purpose in any way, shape or form. I do not know how many times we have all been in here talking about the DTSS. The fact is a person is incredibly lucky on a medical card if he or she can find a dentist and avail of it, but we have all seen that even in those cases, a person may be offered an extraction at times instead of a filling, on the basis of how not fit-for-purpose the system is. I do not know how long we are going to continue talking about this. It would make an awful lot of sense if rather than saying great strides are being made, the Minister of State was saying great strides have been made and the Government has delivered a system that works for the people. It is as simple as that. Regarding orthodontic care and Louth County Hospital, in one of my recent parliamentary questions, I asked for an update and the response was: At this time, the Department is under-resourced, with a vacant consultant orthodontist post. There is a 1.0 whole-time equivalent for the Louth-Meath region, and 1.2 whole-time equivalent vacant specialist orthodontist post in Dundalk clinic. The specialist orthodontist position has been vacant since January 2024. In August 2024, a recruitment campaign was halted due to the pay and numbers strategy, leaving only one valid vacancy to fill. The latest update I received on this is the post has been readvertised. It does not matter about the closing date, we need to see somebody in position. I could say the same about the specialist orthodontist 0.2 WTE post which has been vacant since March 2025 and, again, “readvertised lately.” We need to see that filled. The consultant orthodontist post has been vacant since late December 2022. This is not working at all. I also have a letter from a company saying it offers cross-Border orthodontic health care for patients. It states that the contract that was offered to it has failed miserably and it cannot even offer a private, short-term solution.

Sentiment score: 0.12