Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

St. Michael's House is an outstanding organisation that since 1955 has been providing vital services for citizens with intellectual disabilities and their families. These services include clinical and counselling services, educational and vocational services, employment services, residential and respite care services, specialist Alzheimer's disease services for people with intellectual disabilities, and social, sports and recreational services. St. Michael's House is the largest and possibly most well known provider of intellectual disability services in Dublin and the third largest provider nationally. Elsewhere in Dublin Trojan work is being done by the St. John of God organisation on the west and south sides, with the services it provides complementing the work of St. Michael's House on the north side.

St. Michael's House provides services for more than 1,600 children and adults with intellectual disabilities in 170 day and residential services in the Dublin and Leinster area. Every summer since the Government came to office, I have had to draw attention to the lack of resources for this organisation, particularly in respect of its efforts to assist young people who are completing their secondary school education and do not have placements for the coming autumn. There is also a major issue in regard to the cost of providing respite care services for families.

Funding for services for citizens with intellectual disabilities continues to be inadequate and is doled out on an ad hocand unplanned basis. I take the opportunity to wish the new chief executive officer of St. Michael's House, Ms Anna Shakespeare, the very best as she embarks on that challenging role. She follows in the wake of Ms Patricia Doherty who did tremendous work in that role for many years. Ms Shakespeare will have a very difficult job in leading a charity that has seen a €12.3 million cut in its funding since 2008. At the same time, of course, there has been no decrease in demand for the vital services it provides. Waiting lists are only getting longer and there is the requirement to address changing needs as people with disabilities get older and older parents pass away. The Government often talks about inclusion and equality in education and training, but the cuts it has imposed have forced the closure of a number of school leaver programmes and respite care services.

Like other north side Deputies, I received a number of heartfelt letters last February and March from parents of children with intellectual disabilities who were finishing second level education this year and had no placement to go to, either for training or work in a sheltered setting. Several parents told me that transition passports had been prepared but there was nowhere for their children to transition to. A key complaint often raised by parents and providers is that we do not have multi-annual or guaranteed funding for new school leavers. St. Michael's House has contacted parents to explain that capital budgets are not available and houses are full but an effort is being made to source new buildings across the north side. There is no guarantee, however, if such premises become available, that the organisation will be able to commission them in time to provide placements for the autumn.

The same problem has arisen, as I said, every spring and summer in recent years. A number of people with intellectual disabilities who avail of the services at the St. Michael's House centre on the Malahide Road wrote to me last week outlining their situation:

We are worried that our quality of life has been greatly affected by the cutbacks to our personal income and to funding of the services for people with a disability. We feel alienated and unable to participate in life equally with the rest of society.

The cutbacks imposed on these most vulnerable citizens must be reversed and we must provide sufficient numbers of secure emergency places in residential and respite care services.

Another feature of the cutbacks has been their impact on the valiant staff in intellectual disability services who are dealing with increasing numbers of clients. They are coming under terrible pressure as older parents pass away and adults in their 30s and 40s come into residential placements in an overcrowded setting. There is a huge task to be undertaken.

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