Ms Amy Hassett:

The question of how people know how to identify themselves as disabled is a difficult and complex one, and one we spend much time in Disabled Ireland and the DPO Network talking about. There can be a significant barrier to people feeling comfortable in identifying as disabled. I could talk for 15 minutes about why that is the case, about the barriers, stereotypes, attitudes and about the need for a change in public perception around disability and not necessarily framing it as an inherently negative thing. That fits into the bigger picture of why it can be difficult for people to describe themselves as disabled or identify themselves as having difficulties in various areas. Disability-proofing and the SDGs are part of the same soup. It all fits together. We cannot tackle one without tackling other aspects.

We had problems with the most recent census in that it did not necessarily capture autistic individuals. We have no idea how many wheelchair users are in the country. We are looking forward to the census results coming out, but there will still be limitations to how we can use the data effectively in our advocacy. This issue is by no means sorted. We have to make sure in the future that data is produced in a way that is accessible to various individuals. That was an issue we had with the last census.

Ensuring the data is accessible and coupling it with awareness-raising and a changing public perception of disability will be an important part of capturing disabled people and creating a situation where people are comfortable identifying as disabled. The numbers will be under-represented. The true number of disabled people in the country will not be reflected in the census. That will always be the case and is a change we are seeing over time. We have to push on all sides in order to make it more accurate and more reflective of the population.