Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 23 November 2021
595. Deputy Róisín Shortall asked the Minister for Health the steps he is taking to address the homecare staffing crisis; his views on whether home carers should be included in the critical skills exemption for non-EEA employment permits; if his Department recommended removal of this profession from the ineligible occupations list during the recent review; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [57034/21]
Amharc ar fhreagraMy colleague the Minister for Mental Health and Older People has committed to establishing a Cross Departmental Strategic Workforce Advisory Group. The role of the group will be to facilitate the views of stakeholders and examine workforce challenges in home support and nursing homes. Potential areas to be considered include recruitment, retention, training, career development, and the sustainable employment of home support workers into the future.
Recruitment of the 130 posts funded for the national rollout of interRAI as the standard assessment tool for care needs is scheduled to commence in this quarter. A National Home Support Office is in the process of being established. The testing of the reformed model of service delivery for home support commenced this month in one pilot site, with other pilot sites to be fully operational by January 2022. Last year we secured additional funding of €150 million for home support and the HSE National Service Plan sets a target to provide 24 million hours of home support. This allocation of home support has been maintained for 2022. It is estimated that at the end of September some 15 million hours had been provided to over 53,000 people. This is about 2.2 million more hours compared to the same period last year.
The employment permits system operated by the Department of Enterprise Trade and Employment is designed to facilitate the entry of appropriately skilled non-EEA nationals to fill skills and or labour shortages. The system is managed through the operation of the Critical Skills and Ineligible Occupations Lists which determine employments that are either in high demand or are ineligible for an employment permit where there is a surplus of those skills in the domestic and EEA labour market.
The Critical Skills and Ineligible Occupations Lists are subject to twice-yearly review which is predicated on a formalised and evidence-based process which involves consideration of the research undertaken by the Skills and Labour Market Research Unit (Solas), the Expert Group of Future Skills Needs (EGFSN), the National Skills Council, and input by relevant Government Departments in addition to the public consultation phase.
As part of the most recent review of the occupations lists, officials from my Department engaged in discussions with officials from the Department of Enterprise Trade and Employment in respect of submissions received relating to the health sector. The submissions received from the home care sector were considered by the Department of Health, Department of Enterprise Trade and Employment and the Interdepartmental Group for Economic Migration Policy.
The review did not recommend removal of the occupation of care worker/home carers from the Ineligible Occupations List as the evidence suggested that contracts of employment and terms and conditions being offered are significant factors in the recruitment challenges faced by the sector, rather than a demonstrable labour market shortage. To have an occupation removed from the ineligible list, there needs to be a clear demonstration that recruitment difficulties are solely due to skills and labour shortages in Ireland and the EEA and not to other factors such as salary and or employment conditions.
It was not considered appropriate to make any changes to the eligibility for employment permits for home carers on this occasion as there was insufficient evidence that the issue is not one of terms and conditions. A longer-term approach is required to address these challenges and the Department of Health is committed to working with relevant stakeholders to seek to address these issues.
