Mr. Michael Hegarty:

I echo everything that Ms Nagle has said about the funding amount not being enough for houses. There are also different approaches across different local authorities. Some are very welcoming and will support us as a housing body and an organisation to deliver housing under CAS and, on occasion, will provide up to 100% of the funding. Other local authorities do not help organisations like ourselves or, more than not helping, will not assist them as much as they possibly should.

While the Chairman was absent earlier, we were asked to outline one or two things that would help the situation. Number one, money needs to be ring-fenced from within CAS for persons with disabilities and disability organisations. That needs to be managed by the Department with responsibility for disability matters. There are too many different Departments and agencies involved. Before we can have CAS funding for the people we support, we must make sure there is revenue coming from the HSE to support them when they move into their houses. So you have four people moving into a house who need that revenue before the local authority will even consider it. As there is no multi-annual planning at the moment, that cannot be given so drawing down money from CAS cannot occur. It is a cascade of barriers that are put in our way. I recommend that the Department ring-fences money for the scheme.

There are organisations like ourselves and other members of the national federation, the Brothers of Charity and others, throughout the country that want to deliver. If we were told we had land and money so go deliver, then we would deliver for people. We would deliver appropriate housing suitable to their needs if we were given the option to do so. We have ears on the ground so we know the needs and requirements. If were given the opportunity, we certainly would not let anybody down.

Also, because for CAS you have to put four people together, often they might not be a peer group, which goes against the UN charter in terms of who you live with. To a certain extent, we must cut our cloth according to measure. We understand that but at the moment there is no cloth that we can get. We are certainly willing to do that to be able to uphold people's rights as much as possible. For example, the Minister announced 90 new residential placements and funding for that next year at a cost of €220,000 each. That revenue is there but there was not one brick within her funding because she was not able to do it because the revenue comes from a different Department. Therefore, a cohesive and collaborative approach towards this is needed.

It should be easy to bring those people together. We are certainly more than willing to sit at that table, as we are here, to try to support the committee in its recommendations to drive on and deliver through CAS funding.