Ms Louise Milicevic:

I concur with what Professor Flynn has just said. Certainly, what I discovered from my personal experience is that if you are not in a system and availing of supports, it is almost impossible to get those supports when you embark on pregnancy and parenthood. For example, if you do not have a personal assistant - I did not when I had my first child and still do not - trying to access that support is almost impossible, to the point that I was ultimately told it could not be provided as it did not exist to support disabled parents. It is different if people are already in the system and perhaps have a personal assistant who may be able to support them in their parenting journey, but those who are not in the system will not get the support. Similarly, as time elapses and people and their children get older, if they feel they may need support or could benefit from it and their family life could benefit from it, people are reluctant to seek it because, unfortunately, the call for support seems to be interpreted by services as parents being unable to cope. As we alluded to in our response to the earlier question, people will generally opt not to ask for help. They will struggle along because the fear is that asking for help may result in their children being taken into care.