I ask the Minister of State whether the conditions at the Ballyfermot Health Centre are acceptable in this century, because they were not acceptable in the last century. I have with me a number of photographs, which I will pass to the Minister of State when I am finished. The facility is akin to an airport hangar from the Second World War. Anybody who views these photographs will see the dereliction and dilapidation of which I speak. The condition of the facility is visible even from the outside: there is paint peeling from the walls and there are grilles everywhere. This facility is supposed to help people with mental health problems, but the first thing induced by such a facility is depression. This does not help the staff who are doing a tremendous job in the facility. It does not motivate them when they arrive to work in the morning.
The centre is too small for both the client base and the number of staff based there. The canteen facilities are very poor. Recently, one of the staff was seriously assaulted when he tried to prevent somebody from setting fire to the facility, although the staff have been calling for over two years for extra security precautions to prevent such an occurrence. At the very least, the centre should be kept clean, attractive and user-friendly and should reflect the care we give to those who are ill. It should be a centre of excellence. The state of this facility and the lack of resources it receives say a lot about the priority we give to the sick, especially those who have a mental illness and who may not be able to judge properly the world around them or speak up for themselves. Nobody is looking for a four-star facility; the staff and the users are only seeking the bare minimum.
Amnesty International has called the state of mental health care in Ireland shameful and has pointed out that services are inadequate and under-resourced. We are seriously out of step with international best practice and have failed to comply with international human rights law. That is an indictment of the State. I ask the Minister at the very least to address the problems faced by this centre, but he should also deal with the many other centres that deal with this affliction. One in four Irish people suffer from mental illness and require some type of treatment.
I asked related questions earlier in written form and the answer I received was that responsibility lay with the Eastern Regional Health Authority. The Minister still has an overall responsibility to ensure that the health authorities make sure that such facilities are of the best standard in the world. We should set a standard of excellence that other countries look to mirror. We have ratified a UN convention recognising the right of everybody to enjoy the highest attainable standard of mental health and the best available mental health care. Looking at these pictures and talking to some of the users and staff of this facility, one can tell that this is not available in the Ballyfermot Health Centre.
The Government has failed to act on a serious of reports, both international and national, critical of inaction on the human rights of people with mental illness. We have failed to meet the standards outlined by the World Health Organisation and in the UN principles for the protection of persons with mental illness. It is not good enough to say that there is a problem with funding in all sectors of the health service. The crisis in this facility has not just emerged in the last couple of weeks. It has been an ongoing problem and it needs to be addressed as soon as possible, before another staff member is attacked.
As I said, the facility resembles an airport hangar. There are grills on every window. It would be interesting, if the Health and Safety Authority were to visit the site, whether it would pass muster. I doubt it. I am asking that adequate resources be put into the health sector, particularly towards addressing the problems I have identified, and that the health authority urgently address these problems.
