Holly Cairns (Cork South West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this important motion from the Regional Group and the Social Democrats will support it. Transport is a disability issue. Transport is about accessing education, having employment, being able to meet friends and in general living an independent life. A lack of investment in public transport, especially in rural areas, and the disgraceful barriers in transport support schemes, when they exist, are not only making life harder for disabled people but making life worse for them. All of this is a Government choice. The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, UNCRPD, guarantees the right to be able to access transport, but the State is failing to meet these obligations. I will give just some recent examples from west Cork that are raised with me regularly and that highlight the effects of these policies.

A group of young people and students on the Beara Peninsula have been fighting for almost a year to get public transport to go to school and training. This is something I have raised with the Minister of State several times. Not only did it require the help of the local family support centre and the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, these young people and their families also had to finance their own transport, which some of them had to do from their disability allowance. I have a constituent who is rightly very upset that local buses cannot accommodate his mobility aid. I have been contacted by people who cannot access the supports they need because of the antiquated and cruel restrictions of the primary medical certificate process. There is also the Government’s utter failure to replace the mobility allowance and the motorised transport grant, which were discontinued a decade ago. In 2013, many disabled people and support organisations expressed their concern that the discontinuation of the mobility allowance and motorised transport grant for new applicants in 2013 was disgraceful in itself. The Government assured this was only an interim measure and a replacement scheme would be provided. Ten years later disabled people and their families are still waiting. Moreover, the Government has created an inequity as the people who were in receipt of the scheme prior to 2013 continue to access it, and rightly so, but other people who should qualify are denied it. The Ombudsman’s report from 2021 on this situation highlights the serious and persistent issues in policy. He pointed out that, "Those people who are adversely affected by the current lack of access to transport supports require immediate and decisive action.” In response to my most recent parliamentary question to the Minister of State, I was informed me that the report from the working group was completed and has been published. That was it; there was no reference to the next actions or when a replacement scheme would be in place. Schemes like the mobility allowance and motorised transport grant involve relatively small amounts in the scale of the national budget but can make a massive difference in the lives of individuals and their families. Why has a replacement scheme not been put in place?

The motion also calls for the primary medical certificate process to be reinstated and amended as it is not fit for purpose. Unfortunately, the name sums it up. The primary medical certificate is a symptom of the antiquated and harmful medicalised model of disability.

Under the UNCRPD, the state is obliged to implement the social model and look at how supports can be put in place and barriers can be removed. This Government was fully aware of the issues with the primary medical certificate and concerns raised by the Ombudsman when it changed the relevant legislation in 2020 to reaffirm the incredibly strict and exclusionary criteria for this scheme. The Government had a chance to reform the system and instead chose a very regressive and discriminatory approach. People need a primary medical certificate to access the disabled drivers and passengers scheme which provides for tax relief on adapted vehicles for disabled people, including children. This should be an easy access scheme and should be a case where the State recognises the challenges people face and enthusiastically says, “Yes, we will help you.” Instead, people face the opposite: a bureaucratic process designed to make it as hard as possible and to exclude as many people as possible.

I have previously raised the case of a young Cork woman who had a hand amputated due to a very rare cancer. This young woman, who is adjusting to a life-changing situation, quickly discovered that the loss of one hand was not enough of an impairment for the Government to allow her a primary medical certificate. The cost of adapting a car is significant for an individual or a family. This impacts on her capacity to work, to care for her family and to live. It is simply wrong, and she is far from alone. When is the Government going to act on this?

The primary medical certificate process needs complete reform. What will it take for the Government to act?

Disabled people are being excluded every day because of a lack of suitable transport. We need more public transport routes that run more frequently, at weekends and in the evenings. Being able to get to work or socialise should not be the privilege of those who are able to drive or who can afford a car. The mobility allowance and motorised transport grant need to be replaced immediately. The primary medical certificate process must be changed. The most frustrating and shameful thing about all these issues is that they are all Government decisions. The Government can change these and make huge, positive differences to so many people’s lives. Why is the Government not acting?

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