Pat Buckley (Cork East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Our two guests are a breath of fresh air. With their opening statements, their honesty and their bitterness and anger, they have thrown it all on the table and there is not one point one could argue against them, but it is important that the evidence given at these committee meetings goes on the record. Dr. Crawford spoke about a pilot project. Why has that not been replicated anywhere else? Someone made the point that we are a reactive rather than proactive society. I am black and blue from stating over recent years, including in the Dáil Chamber, that this has been enshrined in the policies of this Government and previous Governments. We are not visionaries. Governments have been told repeatedly by the experts that something is going to happen, but then they wait for it to happen and wonder how it happened, even though they will have been told about it ten to 15 years or, in our the case of guests, 20-odd years earlier.

Ms McSherry's contribution was also amazing, outlining in detail a Pandora's box of courses and so on, which I will examine. I am acutely aware of the Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) (Amendment) Bill 2022. I asked this question in the earlier session, and Dr. Crawford spoke about how quickly we implemented the smoking ban. Likewise, in the budget, excise duty on cigarettes and so on is imposed by midnight on the same day. She referred to parking on footpaths, a pet hate of mine. People do not understand that if someone has some form of a disability - I do not even like using that word - it is not always taken into consideration. As I stated at a meeting of a previous committee, when I was a member of my local council, we listened to all the stakeholders when we were designing the main street in my town. It was probably nine years ago. We covered only 35% of the streetscape, because we met resistance, yet that 35% won a European mobility award because we listened to everybody and engaged with them.

As legislators, what can we do in the here and now, not down the road? I love our guests' determination and drive on this to say they will not listen to the bull crap anymore. They are done with talking. Dr. Crawford referred to the pilot project, while Ms McSherry referred to the research and the courses that are available. What can we do as legislators, whether to the relevant Department or Minister, to say we have listened to all the experts - our guests and others - and ask why we cannot implement the changes now? If they say it is about funding, there has to be funding somewhere to make this an all-Ireland pilot project, whereby resources could be pulled in from the European partners or whatever, and to replicate that. What can we do in the here and now to drive this change? Ours is a very different committee. We are not playing politics. We all have a passion for the issue. I accept our guests will meet resistance. How strongly does the HSE resist change? I am well aware the idea of "It's my way or the highway" is ingrained in the culture.