Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 13 December 2022
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Autism
Autism Policy and Employment: Discussion
Mr. Peter Brabazon:
On employability schemes, we do not particularly focus on any scheme. I was talking about the EmployAbility agency, which is a supported group funded by the State. What we do is that we work in parallel with them. Sometimes EmployAbility suggests people come to us or we do it the other way around and suggest people go to it. I think there are about 20 to 25 EmployAbility offices around the country, some of whom we have very close relationships with - as I mentioned in Tralee and Galway - for a good long time. It is about working in parallel. We placed a young gentleman who needed a lot of support in Woodies in Dublin and essentially EmployAbility's support person worked with and talked to us about how we would do it all. I think Ms Murphy was involved in this case directly. It is about working in parallel with people. We do not compete or take over from any services already there such as in colleges. There was a big worry at one time because disability services were just starting and then we came along. We are complementary to those. If a full service is being provided, we do not need to be there. In Tralee where so many disabilities had to be dealt with, we help with the neurodiverse side of things and particularly with autism.
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