Ms Ann Marie Flanagan:

I thank the Deputy for the question. Ireland is unique compared with most European countries in that we do not have legislation that provides a legal entitlement for disabled people to have services in their own right. My direct professional experience includes working in the United Kingdom under community care legislation where direct payments were enacted in 1996. Nothing is perfect, but that approach certainly does provide a right in this regard to disabled people of all impairments. This is another problem in Ireland. We silo disabled people based on our impairments. That then perpetuates the idea that people with intellectual disabilities and other impairments do not have the same drive for independent living as people with other impairments, such as myself.

The situation then becomes based on economic value. Therefore, someone like me who has personal assistant support can get work and contribute financially. However, we do not know the overall value in respect of an individual’s life or the economy, because we have never organised ourselves in a way that provides independent living supports to disabled people. Therefore, first, personal assistant support services must be legislated for and provided to all disabled people. This is another example of the need to reorganise independent living supports. Ireland, for example, has the third highest rate of unemployment and poverty for people with disabilities in Europe, next to countries in eastern Europe. That statistic comes from a report carried out by the European Disability Forum last year. It is a shocking statistic. One of the wealthiest countries in Europe has one of the highest rates of deprivation and poverty among disabled people. This is related to how we organise services and supports for disabled people.

In addition, and this is not a criticism of the sector, but the relationship between the voluntary sector and the State excludes disabled people. This goes right back to the 1950s and, indeed, to the foundation of the State. In 1984, approximately 140 organisations were providing services to people with intellectual disabilities. Therefore, there is no space for disabled people to speak up for ourselves, to represent ourselves and to say that we want the funding to manage our own lives. Equally, the lack of progress being made in providing autonomous independent support for people with capacity "issues" to represent themselves is also problematic. Like Deputy Cairns, I also call for the commencement of the Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) Act. We must legislate for personal assistant supports. It must also be understood as well that this does not involve just one thing. We must build supports to ensure individuals can have choice and control in their lives.