Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Halligan for tabling this Private Member's motion. I will focus on the respite care grant. In most cases, it is wrong to represent it as being used for frivolous reasons. Often, this grant as well as domiciliary care payments are used exclusively to fill gaps in services that should be available, yet are not. Many services are organised around institutions instead of around the person requiring care. One needs to know the system to get the services that are required.

There are vast differences in what might be available. For example, elder care services provided in west Dublin and north Kildare cannot be compared. I will use a recent instance as an example. Someone who was confined to bed needed a pressure mattress. It was provided in west Dublin. In north Kildare, however, the person was told to source it himself or herself. Often, geography determines the services one receives. The way they are delivered causes additional problems for carers. They must become advocates for and organisers of the other person's needs.

Getting an old or sick person admitted to hospital has become a new battleground. I dealt with a case of a 90 year old man who suffered post-operative complications. Getting an ambulance for him took several weeks and presented an even greater issue than finding him a hospital bed. There is something wrong about that. His doctor spent three weeks trying to get him to the hospital. The HSE has told me that transport may only be provided when, in the clinician's view, the patient would be unable to make the journey without clinical assistance or where the patient must be transported by stretcher. This will cause serious problems for the elderly in particular.

I echo Deputy Joan Collins's points on the delays in processing carers' claims. They take a ridiculous length of time. Often, people must decide that they cannot care for their elderly relatives at home. The Carers Association is seeking a general practitioner, GP, card for carers. If someone qualifies for a carer's allowance, that card should be supplied. It makes good economic and health care sense, as one third of all carers become ill. Keeping them well is in the country's interests.

I will turn to the issue of housing adaptation grants, which are administered by local authorities. Their provision depends on each authority's ability to find matching funds. How the local government fund, LGF, has been dispensed in recent years has been deeply unfair and will not improve, given how the property tax has been described. It is ironic that many counties that fall into so-called poor areas often have more discretionary funding. The qualifying criterion for the housing adaptation grant is the amount of funding an authority can provide to match the amount drawn down from the Department. The needs and resources model is used. It is based on an assessment conducted in or around 2000. What one has, one holds. Counties with populations that have grown in recent years are at a considerable disadvantage.

I wish to address an area in which families' caring needs will increase, namely, where adult services have been withdrawn from young people who have finished their schooling. Recently, I was contacted by someone whose son is autistic and non-verbal. He was told he would be put on the list, but no service was guaranteed. In fact, respite services were going to be removed and day services were to be reduced because they had reached the point at which residential services could only be provided for residential placements.

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