Martin Browne (Tipperary, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

This Bill makes the HSE accountable to the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth for the management and delivery of specialist community-based disability services. I hope the transfer of responsibilities in this Bill will result in a system that has more focus on providing for people with disabilities in their community. However, the Bill will not change anything in terms of the ability of people and children with disabilities to get timely access to the services they need in the community. The phrase "care in the community" has been misused by the Department of Health ever since it was coined. There are plans to close key services in communities across my county of Tipperary based on the principle that more focus is being given to care in the home. However, this has actually resulted in community services being relocated. Care in the community no longer means care in your own community. The people of Carrick-on-Suir and Roscrea will attest to that. I need the Minister to bear that in mind as he takes on these new responsibilities.

This Bill does not address the fact that children with disabilities are being forced to wait incredible lengths of time for the formal diagnosis that would trigger the supports and services they need. There is a young girl in my constituency who had an assessment of need process in October 2020 and that was completed in January 2021. This identified that she required the services of a children's disability network team, CDNT, and that an autism spectrum disorder, ASD, assessment was warranted. She is still waiting for that diagnostic appointment. In the meantime, the family have been told that despite there being general agreement that she has a disability and needs supports such as the domiciliary care allowance, she does not qualify for it because the formal diagnosis she is waiting for has not been done. This is getting in the way of her family being able to make plans for her at home and for her schooling. In another case, a young man with muscular dystrophy was left without home care supports because his parents had Covid at the time. This has since been resolved but they had to fight for it.

There are pitfalls across the board when it comes to the provision of services for people with disabilities. I recently attended a meeting with the HSE's south-east office. It is undertaking a number of recruitment campaigns for occupational therapists, speech and language therapists and so on because of the huge shortage in this area. While I appreciate this, it is the people with needs who are being impacted. The Government may try to take the heat off by highlighting its good intentions, but this does not take the pressure off people with disabilities and their families. They are forced to wait because successive governments have mismanaged the health service so much that it is no longer an attractive prospect for many specialists. These are the challenges that await the Minister. I appeal to him to look closely at how the idea of care in the community is being used by this Government as a way actually to take care out of our communities.

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