Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chair and members for their time. I greatly appreciate the opportunity to come before this new committee. As I said, the reason I have been invested in the autism innovation strategy is not because I want to create new legislation; it is because I want to knit what we currently have in place and make it work, and to operationalise the system through me being in the centre talking to the Department of Education and the Departments with responsibility for early years, housing, and employment. Disability is not just a health issue. It is across all Departments. When we specifically talk about autism and its diagnosis, health is a needs-based model but, unfortunately, education is a diagnosis-based model. Social protection is a social-based model. Therefore, we have to look at the model. We also have to look at what we have and how we can knit it together.

On my autism innovation strategy, I said to officials and my adviser, Noel Byrne, that we have an awful lot of low-hanging fruit where we can make powerful changes with very good interventions. The summer programme is one of them.

There is also the transitioning from early years provision into primary, post-primary and higher education. We see what I have done with the Minister, Deputy Harris, on that, but we also see what the telephone line has done. The funding of that telephone line is being delivered by AsIAm and it is taking a large number of calls. Being able to signpost families to speak to people with the lived experience has been hugely beneficial to the Department and the HSE, which is a welcome intervention and more interventions like that are required and can happen.

I ask the committee to work with us on the autism innovation strategy. I would love the committee to pick the pillars within education, housing, health and employment and for members to tell us what their experience would be and what they would identify as the three issues that we do not need legislation to unlock but that are practical solutions that we need to work with Departments on. The ask is there and whether it is the ask to deliver the summer programme or how we can increase employment, we have to ask the various Departments to help us make it work. The solutions are there.

I will not shape anybody's thoughts on the matter. I would love the committee's input on it. As I work towards bringing forward the draft, I would love this committee to feed into it. Those are some of the pillars the committee can help us to shape in order to help prevent people falling between gaps. We must support families. The funding is there but now we need to provide the practical solutions that are needed to make the system work for people in the autistic and neurodiverse communities.