Michael Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for the evidence, the information and the debate. I agree that in the time to come the State and An Taoiseach will be apologising for the disability services. I say this because we at this committee encounter the unmet need in this regard. I see some of the services and I think the section 38 and 39 organisations were better able to access funding in this regard.

We spoke about residential units and the witnesses mentioned the housing units with fewer than four participants. Many of those were applying under the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications capital assistance, CAS, programme and building their own houses. This is going back 20 years ago. That has been stopped by and large by the section 39 organisations because of the level of bureaucracy and challenge that exists within them. In some instances, there is availability of funding from the State. Some of the organisations and the service providers were very good at this 20 years ago but because there is so much responsibility on them now from HIQA and other challenges, they have to deal with the day-to-day. They can never look at forward planning and engage with the State on how best they can future-proof there. The stats that are coming through on people with disabilities and kids with disabilities are absolutely frightening. One parent I was talking to over the past week or so was frustrated with this but we had a very lengthy conversation. He referred to how it would be if some people would just do their job. There are positions within the HSE and within organisations and Departments. People are looking for direction from them and the next thing is somebody is not responding immediately. I listen to some of the documentaries that have been done about the State, and indeed, other states. I look at some of the European states that are outliers with regard to providing services as well. If only they collectively took responsibility and had the accountability that the witnesses spoke about. We all need to be accountable. Our committee needs to be accountable. We need to make sure we are voicing the concerns of the people with lived experience of disabilities, and their families and communities, on a weekly basis to highlight the inadequacies within the system.

The accountability may have to be at every single level. It would be great to have a new strategy but it would have to be implemented to the letter of the law, to the dot of the i and the cross of the t, and not just another aspiration. That is what we need to look at. As a committee, we will have to look at what information is within Departments. The State will have to address its responsibilities and apologise for what has been done. As we look at it now, I can see why there were challenges in the past because there are certain areas where jobs are not being done to the level they should for the people with disabilities. Senator Clonan was talking about people coming back to their elderly parents. They are coming from the day services which are cut because there are challenges in funding and so forth. There are an awful lot of people out there who have carried the burden for 40 or 50 years and who are now coming to the end of their tether and their lives. They are worried throughout their lives. We need to put that first and foremost.

I thank the witnesses for their honesty, engagement and for their very knowledgeable understanding of the system. What we need to do now as a committee is to take what they have said and what our members have said and, every day we have a public meeting, advance that again. Sometimes we get very frustrated. This frustration is born out of the fact that the money is there. I will conclude with that; the scene of the Minister being in with the officials of the State who were to provide the services and the Minister having to walk out in frustration. That tells us something about the attitude. I always think at this committee, which I have been honoured to chair for the last number of years, if the attitude could change along the way and people could actually say that their job was to make sure that their organisation was responsible, it would be great. Some of the organisations find it difficult to recruit and retain staff. If the proper supports were there and if the people who were walking into those jobs in the morning and coming out in the evening felt fulfilled, it would be different. We have heard anecdotally that those in children services who are pushing to make sure seven people are seen per day rather than two, are being looked down upon by some. That is not coming as fake news; we are hearing it every day.

There is the time-honoured practice that when people get to a certain level they go into the State services, the public services, for jobs. We see people who are in the public service in jobs dealing with disabilities leaving them and going out into private practice because they cannot cope with the bureaucracy of the system.

I apologise for rambling on but I thank the witnesses sincerely for their honesty. If there is anything they think should be brought to our attention, or that we can advance or give a public airing to, do not spare us because that is our job. Our job is to try to make the best of it for people with disabilities. We have a number of committees going on here but we have a very good and genuine group of people on this committee who want to do the right thing and advance it. I thank the four speakers very much for coming in. It is late in the evening. They should keep up the good work and make sure if they think we should be doing more on our committee level not to spare us.