Home Care system fragmented and under-resourced; advocates demand reform

Published: Thursday, September 24, 2026

The National Women’s Council (NWC) today (24th September) called for the overhaul of Ireland’s home care system to address structural issues, such as the fragmented experience of recipients of care, the postcode lottery, and chronic under-resourcing of the system. 

Ireland is at a pivotal moment in older people's care. The programme for government committed to a statutory homecare scheme that will support people to stay in their own homes for as long as possible as they age. Launching its new report ‘Ageing in Place’, NWC said that it is critical the new system does not embed current inequalities and is firmly based in a human rights approach. At the launch, NWC's Executive Director Corrinne Hasson said: 
"From speaking to women, we know that the current system relies disproportionately on women’s care work, but often fails to really recognise or value that contribution. We also know that chronic under-resourcing means that the quality of care suffers, so recipients experience it as transactional or feel their needs don’t matter. Older women are the largest cohort of home care recipients and what we want to see for them is a home support ecosystem that is properly resourced and has equality embedded into the design.” 

14 women participated in focus groups during the research, including disabled women, women living alone, women providing unpaid care, and women living on low incomes. One of the participants, feminist campaigner Ailbhe Smyth, said: 
"The system at the moment is really fragmented, with lots of different people coming to take care of you. The availability and quality of care you receive really seems to depend on where you live. I don't know if safety is really considered, both for older women receiving care workers into their home, and for care workers who are going into homes and not knowing who will be there. Looking to the future and the new system, the most important thing is our right to dignity, and that women are properly consulted, because if we are not, it will fail." 

Dr Karen Hand, lead researcher on the report, said: 
"The current system has major flaws because equality was not part of the design, and the people delivering care are expected to do far too much with far too little. The Minister has an opportunity here to completely transform home care as we know it, and he can be visionary about supporting women to remain in control of their own lives and homes for as long as possible. Not only must equality be designed into the new system, we have to put money into the system if we are going to support older people to stay empowered, connected and contributing to their communities."

The Public Sector Duty is a legal obligation on all public bodies to have regard for human rights and equality in their functions. Susan Harnett, NWC’s Project Lead, said: 
"Ireland now has an opportunity to build a statutory home support system that advances equality, but the design choices made now could reproduce inequalities for decades. Embedding equality, human rights and gender analysis at this stage is essential if the new statutory scheme is to reduce rather than inadvertently reproduce existing structural inequalities. From the outset older women’s needs must be at the heart of the design. That’s why we conducted this research. " 

Find here the full report: https://www.nwci.ie/images/uploads/NWC_Women_Ageing_in_Place_Report.pdf