Tom Clonan (Independent)

I ask the witnesses to hold that thought. It will frame some of the questions I have.

Mr. Darmody commented on his and Ms Darmody's meeting with the Taoiseach, who is supposed to represent all of us. They were puzzled at his lack of alacrity regarding the crisis we all find ourselves in and asked themselves why. I spoke to a previous Taoiseach about the situation of disabled citizens and the lived experience of disability in Ireland being abject. His response was that he could give no commitment to me that he would provide supports for disabled citizens because he felt it was an issue for the family. There is a very conservative, ideological orientation among a lot of senior decision-makers in Ireland who see disabled citizens as having less human value and as being the primary, if not exclusive, responsibility of the family. It is for historical reasons. I cannot really put my finger on it. Do the witnesses feel that Ireland is an ableist State that operates a system of apartheid for disabled citizens in every aspect of their intersection and access points to the social, economic, educational, cultural, political and artistic life of the State? Are we an ableist State?

It strikes me that our community is very fractured. Why is that? We should be the most powerful lobby group in the State. For example, and I do not know whether this has happened to Mr. Darmody, but it has been put to me that I should not speak to the lived experience of disability. It has been put to me that, as a parent, I should not speak to the lived experience of disability. Do the representatives accept, under the provisions of the UNCRPD, that not only do parents and carers have a right to speak to the lived experience of disability, they are actually mandated under the UNCRPD to do so? I also ask them to offer any thoughts they might have on why our community is so fractured and why there is so much infighting and conflict, which fundamentally gets in the way of us achieving what I imagine are our shared goals.

I agree that the medical model is outdated. Does Ireland even meet the criteria of the medical model? I received a secret report this morning that CHI had been suppressing. It shows clearly that between five and 80 disabled boys have become infertile due to a lack of urological intervention. That is sterilisation. That has been done on the watch of CHI. These are issues I raised on the floor of the Seanad last year. The Minister has been aware of this. We are a State that allows disabled children to become inoperable on the spinal list, and now infertile. Disabled boys have become infertile.

Is that not an international scandal? We do not even meet the criteria of the medical model, never mind the social model. What are the witnesses' thoughts are on that?

We are all in this space in various ways. Do the witnesses think our objective circumstances are getting better or worse in the context of regard to the lived experience of disabled citizens in Ireland?