Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for coming in today. My daughter asked me to say "Thank you very much" on her behalf as she makes an absolute killing from returning bottles and cans, which also considerably reduces the amount of pocket money required from her parents.

I want to raise the issue of disability proofing the new recycling machines. When the circular economy Bill was before the Dáil, I raised the issue of disability proofing with the Minister of State and the Bill was amended to reflect the need to disability proof. Therefore, if consultation happened in respect of setting up this scheme and developing machines and there was a requirement to disability-proof this policy, I am at a loss to know how we have ended up with machines that are inaccessible for a lot of wheelchair users and people with visual impairment. The machines do not display instructions in Braille. The machines are silent. There are no verbal instructions, for instance, to say when machines are full. People in wheelchairs either cannot reach the slot where the bottle goes in or, if the bottle is refused, they are unable to put their hand in to retrieve the bottle to put it back in again. I understand this works very well for the majority of people, but one in four people have a disability. Will the Minister of State go through the stakeholder consultation that Re-turn Ireland did with disability groups in the establishment of this scheme? Re-turn Ireland was set up on 1 July 2022. Will the Minister of State give me the exact times, number and whom Re-turn Ireland consulted among the disability groups in designing this scheme?