I ask that all leaders have regard to the time allocated.

Yesterday, I brought the Taoiseach's attention a study by Ms Kathleen Ryan in Trinity College Dublin into our child and adolescent mental health services, CAMHS. I referred to how thousands of children and young people are on waiting lists to access psychiatrists and psychologists, as well as how many professionals in the service were finding it challenging, frustrating and disillusioning, that many brilliant people are leaving the service and how there is a collective feeling of frustration among many of those working in CAMHS. The Taoiseach's response was complacent and revealed a certain lack of appreciation of the crisis in our mental health services across the board.

There has been a 10% increase in the number of children waiting to access CAMHS, with more than 2,500 children waiting. There are 350 vulnerable young people waiting longer than 12 months for an appointment which is shameful given their vulnerability. Outside CAMHS, more than 6,500 children were waiting for a primary care appointment in psychology in January 2018 with 1,700 waiting for a psychology appointment for more than a year.

Timely intervention is essential when dealing with vulnerable young people in such circumstances. This is compounded by the 20% increase in the number of children admitted to adult wards. Some 81 vulnerable young people last year spent more than 630 days in adult wards, which is a traumatic experience. The Ombudsman for Children, Dr. Niall Muldoon, recently made a valuable presentation to the Joint Committee on Future of Mental Health Care, outlining young people's experiences of our mental health services. He consulted 25 young people who told of their experiences. He said:

Many of the young people concerned spoke about the length of time it took to access CAMHS and the stark differences in the availability and consistency of the service throughout the country. They described these delays and inconsistencies as being very difficult. They also referenced the distance between the inpatient units and their homes.

He also referred to one young person who spoke of being placed in an adult psychiatric ward which was "an experience he described as traumatic".

When one adds the problems in recruitment to mental health services, there are real issues. Some 31% of psychiatry posts are either vacant or filled only temporarily and there are 500 vacancies in psychiatric nursing. There are concerns for our mental health services. Does the Taoiseach accept that there are major issues in mental health services particularly in access to CAMHS, that many young people are experiencing unacceptable delays in accessing these services and that there are major recruitment and retention issues for professional posts? Will he consider expanding the National Treatment Purchase Fund to address gaps in our mental health services?

I assure the Deputy that I, as Taoiseach, and the Government are very much aware of the shortcomings in our mental services generally, and in CAMHS. We all have constituency responsibilities and are aware of the cases that come into our offices of those waiting for the appointment to access a psychologist or specialist that they very much need. I am also aware that people are increasingly willing to talk about, identify and deal with mental health. It is a big change in our society in recent years, and a very welcome one. There has been a big increase in demand for mental health services by adults and particularly by children. It is not necessarily solely down to an increase in pathology or mental health problems; it is down to a willingness on the part of people to identify the problems they have, to talk about them and to seek help, which is welcome.

On the progress we are making, funding for mental health services has increased considerably. Since Fianna Fáil left office in 2011, there has been an increase of €200 million in the mental health budget. It has increased from approximately €700 million to €910 million this year, and will increase again next year. That is evidence of much taxpayers' money being invested in our mental health services. In practice that means that we recruited an additional 114 assistant psychologists and 22 staff grade psychologists for primary care child psychology services. Of the 114 assistant psychologists, 111 have been recruited and are now in post and of the 22 staff-grade psychologists, 20 are in post. This is a good example of additional staff being recruited and our success in so doing. It also involves a change in model. Part of the current difficulty is that people are often referred to a specialist. This is a problem across our health service, where a patient goes from a GP to a highly qualified specialist, often somebody with a PhD, when people have different needs at different levels and different referral pathways are needed. The introduction of assistant psychologists is a good step forward in this.

The HSE is also prioritising a reduction in CAMHS waiting lists. The total number of those waiting as of March was 2,691, which includes those waiting any length of time, from a long time to those who may have been waiting only a few weeks. The Minister of State at the Department of Health, Deputy Jim Daly, in particular, has directed the HSE to introduce a 24-7 telephone helpline, to ensure better out-of-hours services, and is also piloting a telepsychiatry project in Donegal, which allows people to use modern technology to access the support they need.

We are also working with Senator Joan Freeman. I met her in the past couple of weeks to discuss her legislation, the Mental Health (Amendment) Bill 2016. It will not outlaw children being looked after in adult units but will set out clear legal criteria for when it is permissible. We are keen to work with her in getting that legislation done in the next session.

Three weeks ago, two psychiatrists in the Waterford-Wexford area resigned their posts because they said services were falling apart. I met the Taoiseach's predecessor over the past two years and we went through these issues, along with Deputy James Browne who has monitored the mental health commitments in the confidence and supply agreement. The Taoiseach can quote figures about increased allocation because of demographics or whatever but too many young people are waiting too long to access services, and that is also true of too many children who are in difficult circumstances. When I meet Ministers, they put their hands out and say, "What can we do? There has been a recruitment failure." Some 44 consultant posts were advertised in psychiatry and no applications were received for 25% of them.

No applications were received for child and adolescent psychiatry positions in counties Sligo, Leitrim, Cork, Donegal, Longford, Westmeath, Laois and Offaly. The Irish Hospital Consultants Association, the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the Psychiatric Nurses Association of Ireland will confirm that the recruitment and retention crisis is affecting services across the board. The Government needs to realise that people are waiting too long and it needs to change tack. Senator Freeman has been pursuing legislation for quite some time. If the truth be told, she has been doing so uphill against the system. Too many children and young people have been waiting for far too long. They are suffering as a result. A change of approach is required.

I totally acknowledge that far too many people have been waiting too long to access the services they need. That is true of child and adolescent mental health and of mental health more generally. It is true of our health service generally. The question is what we can do about it. The first step is to provide additional resources, funding and staff. We are using taxpayers' money to do that. Since 2012, an additional 2,000 new mental health posts have been approved and 1,300 of them, or two thirds, have been filled. That is an example of the recruitment that is happening. Perhaps there is not as much recruitment as we need. There have been big improvements in counselling services. I am sure the Deputy is familiar with the Jigsaw service, which has been expanded. I think everyone agrees that this service has brought about a real improvement in mental health services for young people, particularly because they can refer themselves to the service. There are new Jigsaw sites in Cork, Limerick and Dublin, bringing the total number of sites to 13. As the Deputy is aware, we have worked on legislation with Opposition Deputies and Senators, including Independents. A Bill that was proposed by Deputy Browne became law within the past couple of months. We were happy to co-operate with Fianna Fáil to get that through. In the same vein and in the same spirit, we are happy to co-operate with Senator Freeman to get her legislation through. I have had a very good meeting with her on how that legislation might work. I think we can get it through in the autumn session.