Laura Harmon (Labour)

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit agus a fhoireann anseo. I wish the Minister of State well in his work in his brief. It was welcome to see the publication of the new disability strategy last week, which I attended. I hope it will be implemented in full and there will be consultation throughout with disability organisations and DPOs.

On recruitment of therapists, a new piece of research published in July, led by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and University College Cork, found that there were serious flaws in the current CDNT model in terms of the provision of care. Less than a quarter of the speech and language therapists who took part said they spend their time directly delivering care to children. Much of their time was taken up with administration and meetings as well as unmanageable caseloads. They stated a lack of clinical supervision as part of that. Some said they were heartbroken because of the workload and their inability to deliver in their roles. The Irish Association for Speech and Language Therapists also stated that-----