Colm Burke (Cork North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I have a question on the role of HIQA. My understanding is that the Irish Examinerhas been told in the past three or four days that a statutory investigation conducted by HIQA does no carry any enforceable sanctions and therefore could not be guaranteed to achieve improvements in residential care. I am just wondering about the transfer and we are talking about HIQA but where is an individual complaint filed and what is the role of HIQA in trying to deal with an issue. If parents or family have somebody in a residential setting where the person has a disability, they find they get no response from the residential facility or the organisation running it. If they go to HIQA, the authority has a role, but we find that in many cases people end up going down the legal route, which should not be the case. Are we making adequate provisions and could we do something further in making sure that where there is a complaint, particularly with respect to somebody with a disability, there is a proper mechanism to deal with it?