Mr. John Dolan:

The DFI has made two submissions, which I note in my opening statement. DFI is about making Ireland a fairer place for people with disabilities. We work to create an Ireland where everyone can thrive and where everyone is equally valued. We do this by supporting people with disabilities and strengthening the disability movement. One key thing that we will always say is that disability is a societal issue. DFI works with Government across all social and economic strands and interests of society.

There are executive summaries of both submissions but I will highlight a couple of points. I refer to the unanimous ratification of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities by the Dáil in early 2018, along with the commitment in this new programme for Government to establish a joint Oireachtas committee to assist in monitoring and implementing the provisions of the convention.

The first of these, the ratification, simply commits Ireland to getting on with the work of implementation. The second is critical and it is important for members to understand that it is a unique instrument. Maybe there is one somewhere, but I do not know of any other parliament, certainly in the EU, that has such an instrument available to it. The UN special rapporteur on the rights of persons with disabilities recently stated that every state's recovery plan must have improvement and protection of the lives of people with disabilities stitched into it and must ensure that people with disabilities can have a life, rather than just being cocooned or put in a parking space while we deal with Covid-19.

Services and supports for people with disabilities were in a bad state before Covid-19 struck. Despite the full recovery of the economy, the capacity to provide services and supports was going in the wrong direction before Covid-19. Poverty was decreasing generally but remained very high among people with disabilities. Services were already facing deficits of more than €40 million, and this year's HSE service plan included a 1% cut which was described as an efficiency measure. All of that was before Covid-19. The funding crisis has been exacerbated. Organisations have faced huge losses in fundraising and earned income due to Covid-19. Many organisations rely on fundraising. If the cost of delivering services, including additional costs caused by Covid-19, is not fully funded, people with disabilities and their families will continue to bear them as services will be unable to survive.

The demographic trend is going against us. The most potent example of that this week was the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council's findings on dependency ratios. People are living longer, including people with disabilities. Since Covid-19 there have been cuts to services such as personal assistants, schools, day programmes, etc. Therapies and procedures have been stopped. The supports and incomes of people with disabilities, which were always minimal and often precarious, have become intolerably so in the last four months. Families who were always under too much pressure, as members all know, cannot see how they can continue. As society reopens, we must consider a range of issues facing people with disabilities. Support is required to allow those who are medically vulnerable to continue to cocoon. This includes people with a range of conditions such as cystic fibrosis, muscular dystrophy and many others. As workplaces reopen, those individuals are no longer entitled to the Covid-19 pandemic unemployment payment. The advice of the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection is that they should access illness benefit but many will not qualify as they are able to work and were in work. People who are categorised as high-risk if they contract Covid-19 must be economically supported in continuing to follow the public health advice.

We also need to reflect on what we have learned so far and be prepared for a second wave of Covid-19. The lockdown took a heavy toll on the mental and physical health of people with disabilities and their family carers. Resilience will not be as high if services are withdrawn. We must also plan to ensure that essential services such as respite, home support and personal assistance are delivered safely. We cannot just cocoon and isolate people. They must be helped to get on with their lives. The fundamentals of the economy are strong. Our capacity to borrow is not in doubt. We must invest now to minimise the damage to the lives and prospects of people with disabilities or two things will happen - people's lives and life years will be diminished and any later investment will only show modest returns.

While health and social protection are critical areas, the same is true for the work of other Departments. The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities provides the agreed objectives. That was accepted unanimously by the Dáil and the Government in the previous term. Its implementation must be at the heart of Ireland's Covid-19 recovery plan.

In this regard it would be very useful for the committee to invite the Minister with responsibility for disability to appear before it to explain how the Government intends to stitch the lives and futures of people with disabilities and their families into Ireland's national recovery plan from Covid.

I offer my thanks and appreciation to my colleagues, Dr. Joanne McCarthy and Ms Riona Morris, who did all the legwork.