Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

There is a very urgent need to have in-person day services restored at the Irish Wheelchair Association's, IWA, centre in Cavan town. Recently and, unfortunately, the day services ceased due to staffing shortages. This has caused understandable annoyance and concern to service users, their families, and the IWA personnel at local level. These services are of critical importance to users. The service has been reduced to an outreach-only model with Zoom meetings, online activities and visits to homes. Lack of pay parity for section 38 and 39 organisations is an issue. On becoming aware of the imminent cancellation of day services, I made a strong request to the Minister of State with responsibility for disabilities and the HSE to give additional support to the IWA to deal with the current difficulties. I know from the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte, that in the meantime, there has been engagement between the HSE and the IWA. The bottom line is that we need in-person services restored as quickly as possible with appropriate State support.

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