The Bill is a step forward but it is a really small step forward. What we needed was a giant leap to really take this by the scruff of the neck. Five years ago, loads of promises were made and we were expecting to make further progress in relation to regulation and the provision of care. What we are seeing now is more privatisation when we need more community-based services. We need more resources and people. The reality is that without addressing affordability, the Bill means nothing. I am really concerned. I am contacted regularly by people who are stuck in hospital beds. They want to get out but there is no package, no care plan to get them from the hospital bed to their home where they want to be. Sometimes the package is granted but there is no package there. It is all well and good. Does the Minister of State know the guilt that families are feeling when they are told to take their loved ones home and they have no one at home to mind them? There is no care package to mind them. They are being put under pressure in the hospital because the hospital is crying out for beds. The person themselves, the mother, father or family member, wants to get home. Who is going to look after them? I know of people who have given up their jobs and got a shift. I know families that are lucky and are big enough that someone is staying there every day. The pressure it is putting on the families is just immense. We do not need privatisation. We need more HSE care assistants to provide services for these people. There is a nursing home in my constituency, Heather House, Gurranabraher, on the old orthopaedic campus, the St. Mary's campus. There are 19 beds in a special dementia unit. In August the HSE said it was being snagged. On 16 October, I was told it was completed. On 22 November, I was told they were waiting on registration. Yesterday they were still waiting on this registration. With the number of people I am aware of in the north side of Cork, I could fill it. Not the HSE, I could fill that dementia unit today at Heather House.

Sentiment score: 0.07

I will. I could fill that today. I am dealing with one family. The back garden of their house backs onto the wall of the hospital and they cannot get into it. The man's family are looking out the door when they are caring for their father and there is a dementia unit right there, 200 or 300 yd from his house. Another lady has to stay miles away because there is a shortage of dementia units and beds where people can go. The staff tell her daughter that when she comes to visit, the improvement in her mam is visible and that they can all see it. She is miles away; half an hour or 45 minutes away. When you have a small family with just two people who have their own families trying to make that journey, we need to provide this care locally. We want to take giant steps forward. We want to work with the Minister of State on home care supports and services. The healthcare assistants are going on strike, the HSE support services in Cork, the home care assistants. I want to send my support to and express my solidarity with them. I ask the Minister of State to do everything in his power to resolve the case because they are really needed.

Sentiment score: 0.26