Ms Renee Dempsey-Clifford:

I thank the Senator for a very impassioned and accurate statement on a personal level. I often wonder, and I am speaking personally, whether there is family in Ireland that does not have somebody with some form of disability. I do understand the point the Senator is making. Certainly from the point of view of the Disability Stakeholder Group in so far as we addressed any of the points she has made, and we have not I hasten to tell her, we do believe that accountability is important. Our view is that for the future any strategy, and I apologise for the distaste of the word, implemented at departmental level should mean an annual obligation on the Department to publish its progress. A big bugbear in the Disability Stakeholder Group when it looks at reports of progress to see words such as "ongoing".