Mr. John Sherwin:

The Deputy's question was about self-employment and supports for self-employment. This is some anecdotal discussion. We have five deaf students working in the coding institute going through a programme learning to code. There is every opportunity they could become freelance coders following that course as many people are involved in the digital economy. As part of that course they are doing with hearing colleagues, they had an equal opportunity to join but they have some extra supports in terms of equity of outcome from that course. There are additional supports being given to them through the course of that to help them have the equity of outcome, so they can work in this area when they are finished. The availability of schemes that anyone in the general public can apply for may just not be enough to address the needs of disabled people to have the same kind of outcome to put them in a position to be self-employed. This is something on which we look forward to working with the Department of equality, and with other Departments through the lifetime of the next national disability strategy. It needs close consultation with the different DPO representatives from different areas of the disability spectrum. We are here from the Irish Deaf Society representing the DPO Network, which covers a broad range of disability areas. We need to talk to each of those areas and see what supports are needed because the language supports needed for deaf people to be involved in self-employment and employment are different from the supports needed by neurodivergent individuals. From our perspective, the State often looks for a one-stop shop for disability. We always try to communicate that it is such a broad spectrum of needs that when you want to consult with DPOs you need to consult with all the different DPOs because their needs are very different. I could not claim to have a neat answer to that question about what exactly is required, but the engagement we are now having with the Department of equality in terms of the national disability strategy is promising. If we can manage to deliver the cross-governmental co-operation that the plan is seeking, I think we will be able to answer those questions.