Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)

While this section addresses complaints on assessment or service statements regarding matters including delays, time periods and how and by whom matters are arranged, it does not address content. Amendment No. 99, which provides that the content of an assessment be open to complaint, encapsulates the proper intent of this section. Assessment and liaison officers occasionally will be cranky or will not treat people with sufficient courtesy but this will be rare. Provision is made in these instances to make a complaint.

As this is a resource-based Bill, the content of the service statement will be the main area of contention. We are approaching the end of our discussions on this Bill and will not address every amendment. To do so would require a further two weeks. However, this aspect of the Bill will be vital. To tell someone that he or she may go to court on a point of law is comparable to saying that it is not possible to go to court.

Yesterday, we debated whether the Minister should make provisions at the beginning of the year to ensure that sufficient funding for people with disabilities is made available. Resources will be finite. I am worried that funds will not be ring-fenced. The conditional availability of resources is noted by this Bill. What if resources are not available for the provision in Part 5 for primary education, which is guaranteed by the Constitution? I am not the only person to believe that this will make Part 5 unconstitutional. The Minister of State will tell me that he has received legal opinion. After the fiascoes of the past two weeks, I would not rely on such legal advice. This Bill will collapse due to Part 5.

Complaints should be on significant matters. I do not want people to complain for trivial reasons. People with disabilities and their supporters are too busy to do so. Their major complaints will concern matters which were not included in the service statement and are excluded from the complaints procedure.

Amendment No. 99 regarding contents and assessment makes provision for this. Another amendment which was ruled out of order made provision that, in situations where not every service is included on a service statement or assessment, an ongoing review would be conducted. This means that elements not currently available may be made available in the future and is a sensible approach.

This Bill has a "trust me" basis. Unfortunately, history tells us that people who have disabilities have little to rely on in terms of trust. The Bill does not explicitly include them but we are told that they are included and that the resources will be available. We do not know who will devise the regulations. We will not be involved. We are being asked to be trusting.

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