Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, Independents 4 Change)
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I thank Mr. Hession and Ms Hurley for coming in today.

They have given us much information on where we can possibly go from here. Many questions have been asked, so I will not repeat them.

What are the witnesses’ views on the income disregard? Mr. Hession said it seems to stop at €165 and that is it, in general. That is related to people’s concerns about medical cards. Do the witnesses have much liaison with the medical card section, particularly on the Indecon report and how those concerns can be addressed by perhaps people holding onto the medical card for a bit longer to another point or a maximum scale or something to get more people back into the workplace?

On the partial capacity benefit and the back to work enterprise allowance, do the witnesses have a breakdown of number of recipients? They said they do not have a breakdown of the different disabilities. Do they think that it would help if there was, similar to the Traveller identifier, an identifier for the different disabilities or would that be contrary to the UNCRPD? It possibly would help to identify, over time, people in different categories of disability, where the problems are and how they could be addressed, etc.

The national cross-government strategy to succeed the national disability inclusion strategy is currently being developed. How long will that take? Is there a deadline on that? If so, what is it? Besides the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, what other Departments are involved in the strategy?

The previous speaker just asked about assessments of need. It was said much of it is household. Again, under the Indecon report, is that being matched into the cross-government strategy? How much work has been done on that? Is a particular emphasis on that in the strategy to succeed the disability inclusion strategy?

Among people who have autism, 85% are unemployed. That is a huge percentage. How can that be resolved? It was said a number of people have been called in on that and the Department is going on to the next age group. Under general disability schemes, it would be probably good to know that breakdown from the point of view of people with autism. It is a particular issue among that group of people. I know many of them who are now in their mid- and late-20s and who still have not gotten jobs even though they are quite capable of doing certain work. I will leave it at that.

On filling the domiciliary care forms, people come into my office when they get that form when their child is 16 or coming up to 16 and they are anxious about the process. On the form filling and particularly the GP’s part in stating whether the disability is moderate, medium or extensive, they get worried about the possibility that they might not get the allowance. We have to get feedback from GPs but is there a more effective way of dealing with that aspect of it?