Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I attended the public meeting organised by the parents of 162 children in St. Augustine's special school two weeks ago. It was an incredibly emotional, distressing and angry meeting of parents of children with mild and moderate intellectual disabilities who, incredibly, had letters put into their schoolbags by St. John of God telling them the vocational services that are the critical component of this special school are to be removed completely over the next three years, starting in the summer and in September. The services are to be phased out.

There are 27 members of staff providing services that give meaning to the commitment in the programme for Government to give support to young people with disabilities in gaining access to independent living and education and in having an equal opportunity in life. The removal of the services is unconscionable. The reason almost all the parents had sent their children to St. Augustine's is precisely because of the vocational services that were provided there, which included all sorts of training for life supports and programmes. Staff included speech and language therapists, psychologists and social workers. All of these services are to go and families are absolutely devastated. We cannot get a straight answer from St. John of God. I want to know the extent to which this is the decision of the HSE or St. John of God. Whichever it is, it is absolutely unacceptable and has to be reversed. It will damage the future prospects of a vulnerable group of children, in direct contradiction of the Government’s commitment to increase support, particularly for young people, and to give them a chance so they will not have to depend on adult services. All the parents testify to the fact that the children are flourishing in the school.

If the cuts are not reversed, the children will be knocked back and into further dependency on adult services and their life chances undermined and ruined.

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