Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 5 February 2026
389. Deputy Ken O'Flynn asked the Minister for Health whether chronic pain services are included within any current Consultant Workforce Plan, National Service Plan deliverable, or waiting list action plan overseen by her Department; and if so, to set out the targets, funding allocations, and timelines applicable in 2026 and 2027. [8889/26]
View answer391. Deputy Ken O'Flynn asked the Minister for Health whether her Department has issued any direction, circular, or guidance to the HSE since 2023 in relation to capacity expansion, recruitment, or service configuration for chronic pain services; and if so, to provide the date, subject, and a copy of each document. [8891/26]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 389 and 391 together.
In recent years my Department has provided significant investment to increase capacity in our healthcare services in terms of recruitment, reforms and infrastructure. For example, since 2023, the recruitment limit for Department of Health funded staff in the HSE has increased from 126,443 Whole Time Equivalents (WTE) at the end of 2023 to 136,606 WTE for 2026. This represents a potential increase of 10,163 WTE (c. 8%) in three years. In addition, significant increases in Non-Consultant Hospital Doctor postgraduate medical training places and the number of doctors in training have been achieved in recent years. Work is progressing between DOH and HSE to increase the number of postgraduate medical training places, informed by long term-term medical workforce planning projections. In December 2025, the HSE published its National Service Plan (NSP) for 2026, which sets out the type and volume of health and social care services that the HSE will provide through its funding allocation. The NSP sets out HSE current funding totalling €29 billion, a €2.1 billion (c. 8%) increase on 2025 NSP. €25.2bn comes from the Department of Health and €3.8bn from the Department of Children, Disability and Equality.The overarching goal for 2026 is to have faster more equitable access in every Health Region. For patients this means reducing waiting times across urgent/emergency care, outpatients, surgery, diagnostics, primary and community services - with all Regions expected to improve access to services towards the higher performing Regions. This will be achieved through devolved regional decision making, new capacity, better use of existing capacity and resources to increase productivity and improve performance, digital innovation, extended hours and stronger accountability for delivery.Building on commitments in the NSP, I recently published the Waiting Time Action Plan (WTAP) 2026, as part of this Government’s ongoing commitment to improving access to hospital care and reducing waiting times for patients. The WTAP sets out six overarching and interconnected targets, which will be achieved through the delivery of 36 actions under the themes of “Reforming Planned Care”, “Enabling Planned Care” and “Capacity Optimisation”. As with the NSP, the WTAP 2026 sets out the national level priorities and actions and serves as a critical support and enabler for each Region to improve scheduled care. As such, the HSE Regional Executive Officers (REOs) will each have a key leadership role to drive and oversee the necessary productivity and performance improvements across each Region and ultimately helping to increase access to care across the health service. Under this more devolved approach, each Health Region will receive a core current funding allocation for the needs of its population, with the flexibility to invest where it will have the greatest impact. With effect from 2026, the management of total staff allocations and payroll budget within the various Health Regions has devolved to the REOs. This will enable the Regions to deliver integrated, responsive care, to achieve better health outcomes. This move to a regional population-focused funding model means REOs will have discretion to invest in ways that improve throughput, reduce waiting times, and address bottlenecks, driving innovation and accountability. In light of this increased regional autonomy in service planning, the HSE would be best placed to provide information in relation to recent, ongoing, or proposed developments in terms of chronic pain services. For this reason, I have asked the HSE to respond to the Deputy directly, as soon as possible.
