Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

The people who will be on the streets of Dublin and other cities today have not dreamed this up, they are not imagining it. There have been cuts: Bawnmore in Limerick is closed; the facility on the Navan Road is closed; and Galway is threatened with closure or cutbacks in the services being provided. Last Friday all the service providers got letters informing them of the cutbacks that are taking place. Parents and carers of people with disabilities are understandably very agitated to the point that they are out on the streets because of their fear that they will lose their respite care which in some cases is one day a week or one weekend in every six. This care enables them, as they would put it themselves, to have a life for those couple of days on which care is provided.

It is fair to say that the people who are on the streets today felt that the days of having to protest, of having to walk on the streets in order to bring attention to the needs and difficulties they have in providing care for members of their family who suffer with disabilities were over. They also thought the days of having to publicise the circumstances, difficulties and personal cases of their loved ones in order to embarrass the Government into providing the necessary care were over. I have two questions for the Taoiseach. First, will he give a guarantee today to every parent and carer of persons with disabilities that they will not lose their respite care? Second, will he give an assurance that there will be no cutbacks in the services provided to people with disabilities?

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