Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It is very much needed.

Mr. Gloster mentioned that 167,000 people, or thereabouts, are currently working in healthcare. Are there breakdowns available of how many of them are agency staff or staff who have come from non-EEA countries on a visa? As I have mentioned many times to the HSE and to the Minister for Health, Deputy Donnelly, yet again in September we will have graduation ceremonies in our third level campuses with the best and brightest nurses and doctors graduating and going overseas. They will probably be in Melbourne, Dubai or some other place that is not very useful to the Irish State. Mr. Gloster said earlier that some issues were above his pay grade and this issue possibly is too but the Department, the HSE and the Minister need to grasp the nettle and find a way to entice our graduates to stay here. It is a bit of a false economy if we have so many agency staff, who are hugely valued, and so many staff who have come here through the visa route from non-EEA countries. We need to have some mechanism to retain graduates here for at least a number of years after they complete their studies.