Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank all the witnesses. I will address this to Ms Rogers. I fully support the implementation of the strategy. On the steering strategy, it seems that from 2019 to 2021 the group has met only twice and there has been no meeting this year. That is a concern. I ask that as a committee we write to the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, Deputy Roderic O'Gorman, requesting that this neurorehabilitation strategy and the steering group get back up and running. Time is of the essence. I ask that from today we fully support that. Given that there are more than 26,000 members, both children and adults, are we really aware of the different strands of disability?

Have we actually got the correct data on this? We have many different types of disability and everybody is trying to work together, but are there proper data? How can we ensure disability awareness raising on the level that is needed by the UNCRPD across all sectors? We need to develop a disability awareness raising strategy in line with the human rights and social model of disability and include a roll-out of all disability awareness raising for all staff of government and the departments of public bodies. That is important because it is all about awareness and training. I know people who are wheelchair users and they cannot even access some buildings. Everybody needs training, including ourselves, so that we are more aware. A lady contacted me three weeks ago whose daughter was in a horrific car accident with the mother, which left her in a wheelchair for life. That mother cannot take her daughter on some footpaths, or bring her into some buildings. Obtaining information is another issue. These are the issues we need to address. Another person with a bad disability contacted me. He is in hospital and we cannot get him home because there are no homecare packages for him. Funding is a huge issue. We cannot allow this to happen to the most vulnerable people in our society, people with disabilities. We must ensure there is funding. We have a duty of care to children and adults with disabilities. Is there a lack of communication within different Departments? The witness spoke about housing and it is great to see they are working with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. As councillors and Deputies we constantly fight for ramps, adaptation grants, bedrooms and heating. People with some disabilities feel the cold and need extra heating. We need to build more houses that are adapted to cater for specific disabilities. We must give people the choice between going into care, staying at home, going to daycare services or maybe into a service where they can have both. We have many criteria to meet, and part of this has to be in the strategy going forward. We need to make sure the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage steps in here to do that. Hopefully Ms Rogers and Mr. Hennessy can answer those questions.