Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú) | Oireachtas source

These are shocking figures. The Minister basically said that since she was elected, approximately 40,000 people with disabilities have applied for disability allowance, been refused, had to appeal the decision and were then successful. She is saying that, for the big chunk of those cases, the initial refusal of the application by the Department was incorrect. These are people with disabilities who are struggling to survive and to get what they are entitled to from the State and in 61% of the refusals the Minister's Department made a mistake.

The Department might say that people with disabilities may not be able to fill the forms properly. Surely it is the Minister's job to make sure there is a system of application that is accessible to people with disabilities. She cannot just blame the people who are making the applications for not having all the facts right or not having done the job properly. This is a serious matter. The Department has been wrong in 61% of applications by people with disabilities.

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