Ms Jessica Ní Mhaoláin:

I will respond to the points that were raised with me and promise that I will do so really quickly. Deputy O'Loughlin asked me what I am paying out since I lost the medical card. I did a quick calculation and I am probably handing out between 10% and 15% of my monthly income, at least. That is not a cost that someone without a disability has. It is purely linked to my disability. There might be other costs that I have not factored in but those are directly related to it.

What Deputy Brady said about barriers to employment put up by the system is very true but there is also an attitudinal barrier among some employers. I am not sure whether it is the place of the State to do so but someone needs to address that. When people see a person with a cane or crutches, they presume that they might not be up to much. The attitude does exist although it is definitely waning.

I failed to mention that when my supports were halved and I was home-schooled, my parents paid for grinds. That cost was imposed on my family because of my disability and for no other reason. I did not have a special needs assistant for one of my subjects and I had to do that subject exclusively at home with two sets of two-hour grinds per week, which was quite expensive.

Deputy Murphy O'Mahony mentioned the fear of losing supports. I am not sure about the other people here but I was well aware that I would lose supports by going for and getting this job. I had reached the point in my life that I was so disheartened from constantly applying and having to put the confidence on when I knew people were not interested once they saw the cane that I did not care about losing supports. In hindsight, that was very naive because I feel it now, especially in my pocket.