Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Donegal North East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

My core criticism still stands. The five-year term of this Government is now almost complete. A range of legislation has been drafted, identified as a Government priority and pushed through ahead of recesses and, sometimes, pushed through all Stages on the one day. We are not going to resolve this by arguing here today. What needs to be agreed by all parties, on all sides of these Houses, is that in the term of the next Government, whatever its make-up, we collectively commit to ratification of this convention and to addressing the legislative issues, and that we give that commitment to people with disabilities and their families, as well as the disability NGOs. As the Minister of State can probably guess, it is the disability NGOs that are demanding the meetings with the political parties. They are saying that we in these Houses have failed to address these matters and, ultimately, this Government has failed.

I am not saying the Minister of State or his senior colleague care less about people with disabilities than I do. However, we have to accept there has been a failure in this Government term and it cannot happen again in the term of the next Government. We cannot make people with disabilities a second, third or fourth priority. They need to go to the top of the priority list the next time.

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