Mr. Bernard O'Regan:

I will comment on the first part of the question. I support everything that was said about the experience with service agreements. Our own members have experienced that as well. Boards of directors have been placed in a very difficult situation. They are asked to govern organisations that provide services to people with disabilities, which is their core purpose and the only reason that they exist. They are very driven by a commitment to people with disabilities to provide the best services that they can and respond to their needs. They do so in an environment that has changed dramatically over the past five to ten years in terms of the level of compliance in respect of lots of different regulations. That is very different from how things used to be. The environment has improved for the better but there are consequences, much of which were not properly planned for, anticipated or costed in terms of potential implications. Directors govern organisations and ensure all of those requirements are met. At the same time directors are conscious of the unmet needs and try to respond to them. Directors are being placed in situations where there is not proper and adequate funding for the actual cost of the services they are being asked to provide and yet must provide the services at the level that is expected. For them to continue to do both of these things without adequate funding places them in an unenviable situation. They do not have the finances to do this work, yet are driven by both regulation and needs at the same time. The effect of that on the people we support is either they do not get the services they need or their confidence in the services they receive and their sustainability into the future is always in doubt. Families who have battled for services and got them feel that they have to continuously battle to maintain them rather than being able to say, "We have won this war and we can now move on with other parts of our lives".