Mr. Brian O'Donnell:

Both of us might do so. The HIQA forum is a welcome development, but Senator Burke is right. He did not use the expression, but we often find that member organisations – the service providers – are the meat in the middle of the sandwich. HIQA gets on with what it must do, namely, inspecting and reporting on compliance or non-compliance. I would not go so far as to say that it is not concerned about the requisite resourcing, but that is not its business. Rather, its business is to inspect and report. The issue of resourcing is a matter on which the service providers must engage with the HSE. As the figures indicate, we have had limited success in that engagement. It remains a major issue for us. Anything that the committee could do to assist in that regard would be welcome, given the impact on other services. As Mr. O'Regan mentioned, in order to ensure compliance, significant costs are incurred that create deficits in other parts of the organisations, which undoubtedly impacts on their ability to respond to all identified needs.

Regarding the 1,100 designated centres, those probably include statutory providers and providers of services to people with physical disabilities in residential care. We do not represent those organisations, rather, voluntary organisations providing services to people with intellectual disabilities and autism. To answer the Senator's question directly, I do not know how many beds in the 1,100 designated centres relate to us.

I note that the chief inspector agreed to provide that information and we would be very interested in it.

The subject of day care facilities and changing need is a huge issue for future services planning and one that we highlight all the time. Working in collaboration with Senator Dolan's organisation, the Disability Federation of Ireland, it is an issue that we raise constantly with the HSE as the statutory organisation. There needs to be planning around this because there is no doubt that it is a ticking time bomb. As Senator Colm Burke rightly says, carers and parents are growing older and in some cases are acquiring health issues and disabilities themselves. Their ability to continue to respond is compromised. We raise this issue at every opportunity we get.

The value for money and disability policy review is now called the Transforming Lives programme. It is progressing with its work through a series of working groups. The first working group, of which I am a member, is tasked with forecasting future demand for disability services. It is a work in progress at the moment but the topic is getting a lot of attention in respect of changing needs, carers getting older and the carers' concern of "Who will be there when I am gone?"