Mr. Padraig Mallon:

I thank Deputy Cairns for her questions and comments. She knew of us in Cork, which was good to hear. In terms of simplifying the services, I would like Ms Buckley to talk about that. What is really difficult for families, and Ms Buckley will speak about it from experience, is that the search for services and supports and the energy that needs to be put into that. There are challenges there. I agree with Deputy Cairns on simplifying the services and maybe Ms Buckley could talk about what it is like on a day-to-day basis trying to find, and get access to, a service.

Ms Cahill will talk about what our model does because we have a wraparound service and we also have that co-ordinated care plan. We develop a care plan for children, adults and families where they can be signposted to other services.

In response to Deputy Cairns's point about collaboration and not duplicating services, Crann has two key founding principles. We do not duplicate services. If a service already exists, we do not duplicate it because there is no added value. Nothing happens or nothing changes for the family; it just adds to that confusion of whether they go to A or B.

Ms Jarvey commented on the founding of the organisation. One of our founding principles was that we would not duplicate services. That has helped us to add value and important services into the mix. Collaboration is a key principle for us.

We began offering services in earnest in 2019. In the beginning when we had a team of two people we recognised we would not be able to do this alone so collaboration was hugely important for us. We are fortunate to collaborate with Ascend which are attending the committee remotely. That is an international collaboration which has helped us in giving us a strategic framework. From the initial contact, we had a ready-made strategic framework which we adapted, so we know the value of collaboration.

Locally, Ms Cahill and our team collaborate on a day-to-day basis with all the actors in the space offering services and supports for people with disabilities. Sometimes putting the energy into those collaborations can make a real difference for parents because - Ms Buckley will speak about this - they often do not know where to go next and if we can make a connection for someone through professional contacts, that can alleviate stress.

In the past three years, we have put a huge amount of energy into developing collaborations with organisations that provide services. We work with University College Cork, UCC, which gives us access to practical support from the therapy schools. UCC has helped us to expand our research and in practical ways. An example of our collaborations with organisations to deliver services involves one of our major initiatives this year when we developed an accessible co-working space for people with disabilities. As we all know, we have all moved in the past couple of years towards remote working and working either in the home or away from the office. The Department of Rural and Community Development invested significantly in that area through the National Hub Network. We looked at that and asked ourselves what we at the Crann Centre could do to provide support and a model where people with disabilities could have access to that new world of work and to the opportunities to collaborate in starting or accelerating their businesses or to work in a business where people want to come together in such a setting. We were fortunate to be able to collaborate with Cork County Council, Cork City Council, the Open Doors Initiative, Ballincollig Business Association and the rubicon centre at Munster Technological University, MTU. Through those efforts we managed to bring together a successful co-working space that is purpose designed for people with disabilities. People with disabilities are now using that space to work in a setting alongside others and grow their businesses. As we invested energy in collaboration, we were able to make those connections and bring in the local enterprise office. Sometimes those connections are the key enabler. Those principles of collaboration, trying to simplify as much as possible and not duplicating services, add value. Perhaps Ms Buckley can elaborate on that simplification. It would be interesting to hear the voice of someone who is working in that space every day and trying to find services for her family.