I also pay tribute to the outstanding staff in the Oireachtas, with a special mention for the excellent broadcast workers here, 13 of whom will be laid off over the summer due to the precarious and unfair nature of their contracts.

Almost one year ago to the day, my party leader, Deputy Holly Cairns, raised the issue of more than 5,000 young people waiting for primary care psychology services in the Cork-Kerry region. Of this group, 109 had been waiting for between four and five years. The Tánaiste responded to Deputy Cairns by saying that there seemed to be a particular challenge in the region that he did not believe was replicated nationally. A year later, it is clear from figures I have extracted with great difficulty from the HSE that the primary care crisis is not only national, but it is also across disciplines. We have children waiting up to seven years for physiotherapy in Cork, up to six years for speech and language therapy in Dublin, up to nine and a half years for occupational therapy in Dublin, up to nine and a half years for psychology in Galway and, incredibly, up to 13 and a half years for psychology in Dublin. Astonishingly, during Leaders' Questions this week, the Taoiseach denied that there had been any recruitment embargo in primary care services. Does the Tánaiste accept that he was misled by the HSE about the crisis in primary care this time last year? Does he agree that the Taoiseach distorted the reality of recruitment restrictions on primary care this week in the Dáil? Will he now commit to an urgent recruitment drive to address these out-of-control waiting lists?

I remember the day Deputy Cairns raised the issue and I remember that the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, was here at the time. On the issues in Cork-Kerry, my understanding was that there were recruitment challenges for funded posts. Let me refresh my memory on that and come back to the Deputy directly. The Deputy is correct that there is a nationwide challenge with access to therapy services that goes beyond any particular geographic challenges. I do not dispute that at all.

We are taking a number of steps to try to get on top of this. One is the establishment of a national education therapy service, led by the Minister, Deputy McEntee. This will apply to parents who have a child in a special school, in the first instance, and then spread out to special classes and mainstream school over time. Therapy services will be provided in the schools. This will start with speech and language therapy, occupational therapy and physiotherapy. We are also looking at how we can use private capacity for assessments of need. We have seen a very significant increase in the number of people accessing assessments of need this year compared with last year. We are also increasing the number of college places, with the Minister, Deputy Lawless, to train more people. I accept that this is a very challenging area but we are taking a number of measures to try to get to a better place on it.