Mr. Wayne McSweeney:

I have been through this whole process and have been on both sides of the fence. As Ms Tyner has said, we were sick to death of getting leaflets in the door and being given things to read. One becomes blind to these things because they were everywhere until we got into programmes like this. I trained as a facilitator and I use it in my own work. I work as a support worker in north Cork and I come in contact with a number of families who support young people who are neurodiverse or live with disabilities. I recognise them in a place where I was years ago. I understand the process of going through supporting somebody with a disability, and going through a process where only they were the focus and everybody else was forgotten about. This is of great importance because there are thousands of men and women out there, mums and dads, doing this together or doing it alone, who feel that they are alone and are not listened to, and that their needs are not being met. Our needs were not being met until I sat in a room with 14 or 16 other people who were exactly the same as us and who had all of the same questions and doubts.

When one supports a young person with a disability, it is a very privileged place to be and one feel so powerless. One can then discover that there are other people there who understand what that person is going through, and that there is a service there which if it is implemented can support that person and help him or her to understand and be connected to people who have been through this process, and who are the experts in respect of carers’ services and things that one can do oneself. This can even be a simple thing - if my child will not eat, or will only eat certain things, what can I do? It is the little day-to-day bits that are very often forgotten about. If one is a lone parent and is raising a child with a disability, when that child wakes up at 3 o’clock in the morning, that person has no support.

There is also the effect that it has on two parents. There are a million different things which need to be considered but parents need something like this because if they are going along, and if they cannot get a service, they doubt themselves and fight this fight. There are thousands of parents out there who need something like this and we have to get it. I thank the committee for its time.