Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We expect it to be finalised in the coming months. It should be finalised by 2018. I do not want to be too specific. I have a job to do for the taxpayer as well and I do not want to tie the State's hands in these discussions. That said, I expect the process to come to a conclusion in the next couple of months.

I thank Senator Dolan for his questions. I know that the Minister of State, Deputy Finian McGrath, will be here later to engage on some of these matters. The Senator has hit the nail on the head in terms of verification being such an important part of what we do. As Minister for Health, when I announce on budget day an allocation of so many billion euro, I must be very conscious of what that means to the man, woman or child at home in terms of services and access to services and supports for the year ahead. Frankly, such large global figures mean very little to any of us as citizens. People want to see the granular detail of what it will mean. Will it improve access to speech and language therapy this year? Will there be an increase in respite places? What will it mean for home care packages? People have a variety of questions like that. I can assure the Senator that this is something the HSE takes very seriously in terms of the service planning piece, on which we will engage shortly with a view to coming to a conclusion by the end of the year and the drawing up of service level agreements. In return for receiving taxpayer funding, the HSE will outline what it expects will be delivered in 2018. Making that as concrete and real as possible for people is very important.

Senator Dolan regularly poses the question, and he is right to do so, whether we are making headway in disability services. We are increasing the budgets and the Senator will acknowledge that funding has increased again. Funding was also provided for the decision support service and €3 million was provided for the Department of Justice and Equality to enable it finally to get on and ratify the UN convention. The budget for disability services will increase by about €75 million in 2018. What does that mean? Will that mean better services? Will it mean that we get ahead? Truthfully, the answer is that there continue to be demographic pressures in this area. These are good problems in a way, in the sense that people are living longer and are demanding, requiring and receiving better care. That obviously has an impact on the budget. I do expect that when we deliver the service plan we will see concrete commitments to improvements in a number of target areas for people with disabilities in 2018. I know that the Minister of State, Deputy McGrath, has prioritised and will continue to prioritise, through the service planning process, issues such as respite and emergency placements because there was a particular and growing challenge with that this year. We saw many cases of parents with a child - often an adult child - at home reaching breaking point. They then have to make that extraordinarily difficult decision to put their child into residential care. Often, the needs of the child are so complex, however, that finding an emergency place can be a very big challenge. The Minister of State has highlighted that as a priority. He has also highlighted the issue of speech and language therapy along with the flagship issue, which he is taking very seriously, of ratifying the UN convention. When we get down to the level of the service plan, the Minister of State will be able to engage further with the committee. The HSE may also wish to comment at that point.