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

I thank Ms Duffy and Ms Cox for their opening statement, their honesty and their passion. I love it. Sometimes people come in here and they have a fear of cameras or whatever. The witnesses are spot on about a rights-based approach, based on needs, not means. We have been hammering that here for the past number of years, in the context of Sláintecare, the future of mental health care and so on. They mentioned ageing out of services and the mental health stress of over 50% of family carers about what is going to happen to their children once they pass on. Could the Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) Act overlap into those services as a backstop for people? Surely it would give them an option to nominate somebody to look after Brian or Mary in ten years' time. That just came into my head when Ms Cox was talking about it. I am glad our guests have said on record that families have no right to respite themselves. People may not be aware of that. It is 2023. I do not envy anyone when it comes to planning or policymaking. This should have been done 20 years ago.

My big bugbear for the past seven years - it was mentioned by Ms Cox - is the optional protocol. Why do the witnesses think it is so difficult for the Government to ratify the protocol? I have my own opinions on it. I think it is because it would be based on the person's needs, and the Government will not be able to supply it. It should be like was mentioned already, namely, a different kind of High Court case. One of our guests referred to the culture change within the education system and how there should be a culture change within the whole system. This is about a rights-based service based on people's needs. If I break a leg, I am not going on a waiting list for six or 12 months. It has to be fixed. I am worried about training, recruitment and retention. I think it can be addressed. Ms Duffy and Ms Cox are right about the schools and stuff but there has to be a big buy-in from everybody. It is about supporting everyone.

The job family carers do is just infinite. We cannot put a price on it. I am very conscious of the stress that those families are under and that they cannot get a break. I was not aware and I cannot believe that we do not know how many beds or services associated with the beds there are in the country. I do know that in some places they are actually closing respite centres. It was not this committee but another committee where we had witnesses from the HSE and, like Ms Duffy said, it could be a tiny tweak. It was 78 cm of a gap between the two beds and they wanted to shut the five-bed ward down instead of taking the common-sense approach of making it a four-bed ward. I do not envy Ms Duffy and Ms Cox on where they are going there.

My big issues relate to the question on the Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) Act and the witnesses' opinion on why Ireland has not ratified the optional protocol. We ratified everything else in and around 2018. The optional protocol has just been dumped on the shelf. There is a lot in that and I spoke slowly and all.