Home Care Coalition calls for increased investment in Home Care due to a deepening crisis

The Home Care Coalition, an alliance of 23 organisations, is urgently calling for increased investment in home support services for older people. This comes as a result of the deepening crisis in the care industry driven by persistent challenges in workforce recruitment and retention, alongside growing demand for home support among older people and people with disabilities. This has led to uneven access to services across Ireland, effectively creating a ‘postcode lottery’ for essential home support services.

The Coalition welcomes the commitments made by government, to increase home support hours for older people and people with disabilities and introduce a Statutory Home Support Scheme. We are calling on government to use Budget 2026 as an opportunity to deliver on those promises and ensure people are supported to live and be cared for at home.

The Coalition is calling for a rebalancing of the state’s investment in care which currently sees Government allocate 1.5 times more funding to long-term residential care (€1.23bn allocated to Fair Deal in 2025) than it does to home support services (€838m allocated to home support service in 2025).

Research carried out by the ESRI in 2019 found Ireland has the second highest level of unmet need for home care out of 11 European countries. This persistent imbalance undermines the principle of person-centered care and limits real choice for individuals and families, many of whom would prefer to receive support at home.

The Home Care Coalition are calling on government to:

• Provide an increase of €266.5m in funding to deliver sustainable home supports services.
• Allocate €110m to address the pay disparity of Section 39 and Section 38 workers and fund the projected increase in costs necessary for regulatory compliance.
• Publish a timeline for the introduction of the Statutory Home Support Scheme.
• Fund research to project demand for a Statutory Home Support Scheme for adults with a disability

The Home Care Coalition urges government to use Budget 2026 as a signal of their commitment to the principles of Sláintecare by providing the investment necessary to support people to live healthier lives at home and in their communities and avoiding unnecessary or premature admission to hospital or residential care.

About HCC
The Home Care Coalition is a group of 23 charities, not-for-profit organisations and campaigners including organisations who work with older people, people with disabilities and people with long-term illnesses, organisations working directly with family carers, and groups working in the primary care sector.

The Coalition was established in 2017 with the aim of ensuring the implementation of an adequately resourced, rights-based, and person-centred, statutory home care scheme, with equality of access and availability to home support services across the country.

Members of the Home Care Coalition:

Age Action                                                            Age and Opportunity

ALONE                                                                    Alzheimer Society of Ireland

Care Alliance Ireland                                         Cheshire Ireland

Cystic Fibrosis Ireland                                       Disability Federation of Ireland

Family Carers Ireland                                        Irish Heart Foundation

Irish Hospice Foundation                                Irish Motor Neuron Disease Association

Irish Wheelchair Association                         Multiple Sclerosis Society of Ireland

Neurological Alliance of Ireland (NAI)       National Women’s Council of Ireland

Northside Homecare                                        Rehab Group

Roscommon Support Group                         Sage Advocacy

Senior Citizens’ Parliament                            The Great Care Co-op

Third Age