Owenacurra re-registered for further three years despite HSE plans to close centre

Owenacurra was first slated for wind-down in June of 2021, with an expected closure date of the end of October that year but remains operational some 18 months later.

The Owenacurra mental health facility in Midleton has been re-registered for an additional three years by the HSE, despite the executive’s prolonged attempts to close the centre.

Owenacurra was first slated for wind-down in June of 2021, with an expected closure date of the end of October that year.

The centre remains operational some 18 months later following a determined protest campaign by its residents, their families and locals, though only six of the 20 occupants remain there.

The HSE said its decision to re-register the facility as an official centre for an additional three years would have no effect on its intention to close, however.

Michael Fitzgerald, the HSE’s chief officer for Cork/Kerry Community Health Organisation, said the renewal was “not indicative of any change of emphasis or change of course”.

“We continue to plan to close the centre in a much shorter timeframe. We continue to work with the remaining residents and their families in relation to alternative placements,” he said.

Meanwhile, pro-Owenacurra advocates have called for the Mental Health Commission’s (MHC) delayed appearance before the Oireachtas health committee in the coming weeks to be dealt with in two sessions so the issue of the centre’s closure does not get lost in a discussion of the issues surrounding the HSE’s child and adolescent mental health services (Camhs).

The MHC had responded to an invitation from the committee asking for a deferral until after this Easter in order that the review of Camhs by the Inspector of Mental Health Services would have time to be completed.

In that same communication, the MHC claimed a legal matter which had allegedly precluded the commission from discussing the Owenacurra situation at a meeting of the Oireachtas disability matters committee last December “is no longer an issue”.

However, prominent Owenacurra campaigner and local Green councillor Liam Quaide last week wrote to health committee chair Seán Crowe stating the issues in Camhs are so vast it is likely that discussion of the Owenacurra centre closure would be overtaken almost entirely at such a hearing.

“It would be very important for a proper consideration of the issues relating to the Owenacurra centre closure that Camhs would be dealt with in a separate meeting,” Mr Quaide said.

Separately, the health committee has urged the board of the HSE to attempt to “build public trust” in the organisation by having a “critical distance from the decision-making of the HSE” and not simply repeating the same speaking lines emanating from the HSE’s Cork-Kerry section.

In a letter to the board, Mr Crowe said the committee had been “concerned to receive repeated briefings on the Owenacurra centre closure from the HSE board which appear to amount to a repeat of briefings already received from Cork HSE management”.