Tom Clonan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Professor Cooney is very welcome to the Houses. It is great to meet a colleague. I worked in Technological University Dublin, TUD, for 20 years and have been involved in a number of his courses. Regarding the whole Trinity College Dublin question, the Supreme Court judgment at the end of this month may actually produce a TUD Senator as well as a Trinity College Dublin Senator. It could be double hats. I will ask three questions. I will come to Mr. Hennessy last but will ask him to answer first, if he does not mind.

I refer to the opacity around supports; there is no one-stop shop to which people can go to find out what supports are available. This is a universal theme across the whole lived experience of disability. Nobody will tell you anything. In fact, not only is there not a one-stop shop but I have always experienced a huge pushback even from social workers. They do not want to tell you what is available because they do not want to administer it. They cannot be bothered with the work of it. In many cases, they are incentivised to return funding to show efficiency so they do not want to spend their budget either. It is a combination of those things. First, the LEOs were mentioned but apart from the Citizens Information Centre, which is the only place I have ever encountered that is actually willing to tell you what is there in any kind of a meaningful way, can Professor Cooney identify an agency or an enterprise which should be tasked with providing a one-stop shop for disabled entrepreneurs and disabled self-employment people? I direct that first question at Professor Cooney. I will move on and will let Mr. Hennessy answer first then.

Second, I am interested Mr. McCann's business Access Earth, and the service he provides and the business he services and supports. Professor Cooney referred to the disability agencies talking about getting disabled citizens into employment but not necessarily mentioning the whole entrepreneur piece. Is that a function of them not being disabled persons organisations, DPOs? I wonder whether there a space for a DPO or even a business, not unlike Mr. McCann's own, that could tie these things together and mentor and support. Is Mr. McCann aware of a DPO either here or in any other jurisdiction that has leadership in this area in trying to support and scaffold disabled entrepreneurs and citizens?

The final question is for Mr. Hennessy who can answer first. I am going to ask him a slightly personal question and he does not have to answer. I thank him very much for coming before the committee today. I was very moved by listening to him speak about his rehabilitation. He said he spent six months in a wheelchair and then two years before he could finish a sentence, if I am correct. Having been a member of this committee, and when listening to colleagues and many of the witnesses who come in, I am conscious there is an assumption that disabled citizens are actually fully supported. This assumption is also often in the literature. There is an assumption that they have the therapies, interventions, and supports that they need. My experience is having a child, now an adult, with a disability. My experience of his journey is that there are no therapies. He did not get physiotherapy or speech therapy. Was that a challenge for Mr. Hennessy as an adult who acquired a disability? During that period, did he get the physiotherapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy supports and is he still getting those supports, or does he have to access them privately? I imagine that is another piece of the jigsaw in order to be able to function and to drive and lead his business.