I wish to again raise the lack of funding and staff to provide an adequate home help service in Kerry, which has been promised. I have raised this issue since I came into this House over two years ago. All that people are getting when they reach 80 or 85 years of age is five hours a week. Is this fair? There are 168 hours in the week and to be given just five hours a week is miserly. They get no home help on Saturdays, Sundays or bank holidays. I do not think the Taoiseach is listening to us at all when we raise this issue. It is not fair. People can get into nursing homes but that is not where elderly people want to finish up. They would like to stay as long as possible in their homes. I ask the Government to make more funding available to the home help service and to provide more staff.

Thank you, Deputy. The time is up.

It is part of what we see here today. The Taoiseach and the Government have little regard for small babies and I suppose they have less regard for elderly people. That is what is wrong and it is why people are not getting the satisfaction or getting the due regard they are entitled to.

I call Deputy Michael Healy-Rae on the same matter.

The Taoiseach is aware the programme for Government states that not only is there to be adequate home help for people, but there is also to be home help at weekends. Because of lack of investment by the Government, not only is there not an adequate service on the five days during the week, but it is non-existent on Saturdays and Sundays. Many families are completely unable to provide that level of help at weekends and they need assistance. It is not the fault of the people giving the home help that the resources are not being given to them. I call on the Taoiseach to honour the promise and commitment in the programme for Government, which clearly states that adequate home help, where it is needed, will be provided. That is not happening at present. It is disgraceful to deal with our elderly people in this way. The cheapest place to keep an older person is in his or her own home. It is where older people want to be, if they are able to be there, and they should be assisted in every way.

I call Deputies Curran and O'Dea on the same matter.

We have raised this matter before. At the end of February there were 52,000 people in receipt of home support services but there were 6,000 people waiting for those services. These are people who are in hospital or who might have come home and who have been approved and it is causing considerable difficulties. I acknowledge the 52,000 figure is up on last year but my point is that the resources available are inadequate to meet the need. It is not just a problem in Kerry. All of us around the country are experiencing the same difficulty, in that the HSE is approving home support services but is not in a position to facilitate them. When this has been raised before, the Taoiseach comes back and says the allocation has been increased from last year. However, the allocation increase on last year is grossly insufficient to meet the current need.

There is a specific commitment in the programme for Government to "introduce a uniform homecare service so all recipients can receive a quality support, 7 days per week". As Deputy Curran said, it is meaningless to say, as the programme for Government does, that the Government is going to increase the funding every year because the numbers are running ahead of the funding and the situation is getting progressively worse. When are we going to reach this nirvana where we will have a uniform home care service and where people will receive quality support, seven days a week?

As Deputies have acknowledged, funding for home help has increased and is increasing, year on year. However, I also acknowledge that the demand is increasing and that demand currently exceeds supply, both financially and, sometimes, when it comes to finding staff to provide the service, even when the finance is available.

Our plan of action is to develop a fair deal-type scheme for home help. As one of the Deputies acknowledged, it is sometimes easier for people to get a nursing home place now than to get home help. That is an enormous anomaly and an inefficiency. The Minister of State at the Department of Health, Deputy Jim Daly, is now advancing work on developing a fair deal-type scheme for home help. It will not be the fair deal scheme but it will give people a guarantee of home help within four or five weeks, as is the case with fair deal.