Ms Ann-Marie O'Boyle:

What Mr. Deering is saying about the design of services is applicable to assessment and what has been said about housing and transport. We have this issue where we are trying to fit people into the system as opposed to developing systems for the people. There is a lot of mention in various policies of person-centred care. If that is to be something other than in name only, it needs to be firmly embedded in the provision of services that really provide what is needed. Person-centred care benefits not just individuals in giving them what they need but also society as a whole. This was mentioned by the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission. If we are still following a person-fitting-the-system approach, which is based on the medical model, we are losing out on the enrichment and all the benefits that can be got from involving people with disabilities in society. Autistic people are a really good example of that; just because someone processes information differently or thinks differently, it does not mean they think wrongly or that how they process information is wrong. That would be a medical interpretation. Instead, a social model utilises those strengths and focuses on the positives.

Sometimes we do not do this and we focus on the negatives and look at things as a burden. This is possibly where we are going wrong. Instead of trying to fit a triangle into a rectangle-shaped hole we need to look at individuals and what their actual needs are in terms of developing systems.