Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Government, in launching the service, suggested that 18,000 people would access it in the first 12 months. I am sure the Government did not pluck the figure out of the air, but it must be deeply disappointed about the uptake. Is one of the reasons for the slow uptake the convoluted route to acquire a protected certificate and the onerous mechanism involved? Does the system need to be reformed? For example, a PIP could go to the Circuit Court for a certificate instead of using the service, which seems to take a long time.