Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 2 December 2021

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Disability Matters

Aligning Disability Services with the UNCRPD and Considering Future Innovation and Service Provision: Discussion ^

Photo of Michael MoynihanMichael Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the witnesses from the Neurological Alliance of Ireland and the National Federation of Voluntary Service Providers. Having listened to the evidence this morning, the two phrases, "unmet need" and "multiannual funding" stand out for me in regard to the challenges on the neurological side. There is an issue in regard to the strategy and the group not having met yet, which we will take up and follow through on because that is totally and absolutely unacceptable.

Some witnesses and members spoke of the challenges all families face in accessing diagnoses and therapies and the change in the reconfiguration of services that has caused a major upheaval. I am glad that upheaval was acknowledged. Major challenges face the services. I have some questions for the representatives of the National Federation of the Voluntary Service Providers. On foot of all the evidence given, we must follow up on the non-meeting of the strategy group and on the unmet need for disability services.

Do the voluntary service providers and voluntary organisations have a staffing challenge as against the services provided by the HSE? Do they also have an issue in providing staff increments with respect to increments dating back to, say, 2008 or 2009?

Insurance is another issue. Some of the service providers with which I have been dealing have raised the issue of getting independent insurance. A great deal of their fund-raising goes towards paying their insurance costs alone, not towards covering the cost of the services required for people with disabilities. The voluntary organisations have provided a massive service during the past 50 years since they started off in the late 1960s and they have stepped in where the State abandoned the provision of such services. There is now an attempt by the HSE to abandon the voluntary organisations and to streamline the services into the HSE. That would result in the loss of the community based agenda of those services and the ethos underpinning them which is to try to help everybody and to provide for them in their own communities. I have a number of issues with respect to all of that. We will discuss the unmet needs for disability services. We will also discuss the strategy group not having met, which is unacceptable. Meetings can be arranged electronically at present. There is no issue about that. We will follow up on that. Will the representatives of the voluntary organisations give their views on staffing and recruitment, the attempt by the HSE to almost silence the voluntary organisations and on the insurance issue? Dr. Harnett might respond first.