Ms Tara O'Donnell-Killen:

Nem Kearns will have more detail on the policy piece. We would very much align with the submission made by Inclusion Ireland. It is so great to hear the Deputy talk about that and about the human rights aspects of this. That is exactly how we see it. We are not dismissing, in any way, all of the struggles that are faced by autistic or otherwise neurodivergent people or any of these intersectionality issues in our society.

I would like to respond to what the Deputy said about prisons and courts. It is fantastic to see that there are separate teams within our public system who are trying to work out how to help the people who are in the system already. We have been approached by some of the psychological and support teams that look after incarcerated young people because they are recognising that there are huge numbers of undiagnosed neurodivergent people in the system and they want to know how to help them from a human rights perspective. They know that their knowledge is outdated and it is excellent to see that they have sought funding to put training in place. There are silos, as the Deputy said, but there are also great teams of people who want to make a difference but they need help, from the top down, to make that a reality.