I am grateful to have the opportunity to raise this matter and to have a senior Minister to respond. He has also welcomed Fianna Fáil legislation which was decried not so long ago.
I am sorry to have to raise this matter in the House, but I have raised it at every other possible level. I speak on behalf of a family which includes a mentally disturbed 37 year old male whose condition may even be psychotic. There are two other adults in the family, aged 31 and 32, who also need care. Their parents are in their 70s and unable to cope with the mentally disturbed male. He requires at the very least respite care for the sake of the parents. A place in Bawnmore Centre would be the ideal solution but that is currently not available.
At the moment, he is effectively being controlled by medication, but I am concerned that this may not be sufficient. His parents live in constant fear of what might happen. I understand that all places in Bawnmore are occupied and that this individual cannot be accommodated. However, the family do not want to have him permanently accommodated and would be satisfied if respite care were provided. There ought to be another location to which a person such as this could be sent. Although the staff at the local psychiatric hospital would say that his condition is not appropriate to their services or facilities, the health boards should make an exception in this case where the elderly parents are unable to cope and accommodate him for two or three weeks.
I am disappointed with the handling of the affair over the last two to three weeks. I have been in constant contact with the health board and the Minister's office. These people have effectively been abandoned with three mentally disturbed adults in the house, one of whom is behaving in such a manner that the elderly and frail parents are fearful. The parents feel that the State services have abandoned them and have asked me to pursue on their behalf any avenue open to me. I am sorry it has come to the stage that I must raise it in the House, but it is a serious matter and warrants a much stronger response from the State than we have had heretofore.