Imelda Munster (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I commend an Teachta Tully on her hard work on this issue and on tabling this motion. We tabled this motion to demand that the Government and the HSE protect the rights of children with disabilities and to ensure they can access the services they need. The situation at the moment is dire. Children are not getting an appropriate AON procedure and they are not accessing the services they need. Waiting lists for therapies and interventions are out of control and children's disability services are seriously understaffed. Frankly, it is disgusting for a Government and public health service to treat some of the youngest and most vulnerable members of society like this. We have heard excuse after excuse from the HSE and nothing ever changes. The Government sits on its hands and has allowed the HSE to become a law unto itself.

We all know how important early intervention is but the Government and the HSE are content to leave thousands of children and their families to languish without any support or help. Parents are at their wits' end. As it stands, both the Minister and the HSE are breaking the law. We know this from the recent High Court ruling that found that the current assessment of need procedure is not in line with the Disability Act. Most of us already knew this. Parents and those who work in disability services knew. The Minister for Health has to have known this all along and yet did absolutely nothing about it. The Minister of State has said that the Government is accepting our motion. He also said that it accepted our motion on this issue on 8 March. What we are calling for is action. I see a pattern here of the Government accepting motions we table because it does not have the balls to oppose them. Just look at this Chamber today. Let any parent who has a child who suffers with a disability look around this Chamber. Not one bloody member of the Government could be bothered to come in to listen to the debate and to what those parents and their children are enduring at their hands. They ought to be ashamed of themselves. We are looking for action and, by God, they better deliver it.

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