Holly Cairns (Cork South West, Social Democrats)
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Before I begin I want to recognise that yesterday was World Down Syndrome Day and many of the issues we are discussing today affect children and young people with Down's syndrome. I also want to recognise the invaluable work carried out by the Ombudsman's office in holding the State and the HSE to account for their successive failures to provide services to people with disabilities. My questions will be directed to the HSE representatives.

Inclusion Ireland's recent survey on progressing disability services found that 85% of over 1,000 families have waited or continue to wait for more than a year and a survey from AsIAm last year had similar results. Down Syndrome Ireland's recent survey found a disgraceful lack of services. It found, for example that 64% of respondents in the Cork-Kerry CHO 4 area reported that their children received no therapy of any kind. A Dáil motion two weeks ago condemned the current situation for young people with disabilities as a gross and unjustifiable inequity in healthcare and education provision. The evidence is overwhelming that the progressing disability services, PDS, programme is a failure. It is failing children and their families, it is breaching their rights and it is not providing therapies where they are most needed and most effective.

Mr. Reid claimed that there are now 91 CDNTs in place across the country but that is untrue. We have only partial teams across the country. If Ireland had started with ten players last Saturday in the rugby, no one would have said we had a team. Children with disabilities at least deserve the same standard. The HSE does not have 91 teams. When will fully staffed and resourced teams be in place? What date is the HSE working towards to achieve that? The HR resources audit of community disability network teams to identify gaps was completed last November but in today's opening statement, four months later, there was no update or change with regard to recruiting the required staff.

What is being done to resolve the massive inequalities based on geography? The Down Syndrome Ireland survey confirmed the worrying variations in services across Ireland. In CHO 2, which covers Galway, Mayo and Roscommon, 35% of children did not receive any kind of therapy in the past year but this figure was almost twice as much in CHO 4. In November 2021, Professor Mac Lachlan explained that the PDS is about replacing the previous system under which accessing services often depended on where people lived and how rich they were but the HSE has not improved that system. Accessing services is still a geographical lottery and families that can afford it have to turn to private service providers while others simply cannot access services at all. What is being done to address this? Is the HSE committed to the establishment of full multidisciplinary teams in all regions.

It was recently reported in the Irish Examinerthat parents of children with disabilities are being ordered to attend training courses so they can carry out therapies on their own children, who remain on long waiting lists. They were reportedly told that if they do not avail of these courses, their children will be taken off HSE waiting lists for therapies. Are training courses for families being used as some sort of replacement for fully qualified therapists? How many children have been removed from waiting lists by the HSE?