Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Here we go again. Since I was elected in 2016 I do not know how many times I have talked on these budgets and on these motions. Tonight we say we have been talking for a few years. Actually we have been talking for a very long time. The disability capacity review is a good place to start. The Minister of State did one of the introductions on that, along with the senior Minister and the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman. That set out the situation. It set out the unmet need. It set out, damningly so, what happened from 2008 onwards. We talk about the crisis. That crisis created a huge crisis in all the services and they have never recovered. I see the Minister of State is nodding. I know she agrees with that. I have marked a few pages. I have read it and marked it. What is interesting about it is all the reports that went before it. It is important to say that, so when we are critical it is because there is a whole background to people with disabilities fighting on a daily basis for a framework that recognises that services must be given to them as of right, that is, a framework within a rights-based approach.

I welcome the confirmation tonight that the optional protocol will be signed, although there is a gap in relation to when precisely it will be signed. Looking at the disability capacity review in 2012, can you imagine we talked about transforming lives back in 2012? In 2014, there was a value-for-money policy review of disability services and we continued on up to 2022 and 2023, which was an interesting year because there was the Indecon report on the cost of disability, which was never implemented. There was the Joint Committee on Disability Matters, which did great work, as well as some other report within a year between 2022 and 2023. All of them begged us to deal with people with disabilities, which is more than 1 million people, depending on your definition of disability. I recall years ago in Galway we passed the Barcelona Declaration to take away the distinction - good design enables and bad design disables. It was in relation to physical infrastructure in Galway. I had the privilege of tabling that motion. It was to get away from distinctions and having a universally accessible city. It is great in theory - dishing footpaths and so on and making it accessible. We got quarterly reports for about two or three years, which are all gone by the board. When it came to businesses and support for businesses, which I support, when they took over the public space, nobody once considered the Barcelona Declaration or even looked at it to see if we were in compliance with our obligations under it. We are here tonight again with a motion from Sinn Féin, which I thank. I thank its members for the details they have set out. I welcome that the Government will not table a counter-motion. I would like to hear what it is doing now. I am not here to lambaste the Government, although I am highly critical because we seem to learn nothing and we get more and reports. We have just passed a budget with ample opportunity to put the reports into action in a way that would help the economy to thrive but we did not do that. I am standing here again speaking to this motion and asking at what stage will what we say match the reality?

I refer to a letter which I do reluctantly; I have taken the person's name off it. That family is looking for respite for a nine-year-old child. The answer came back from somebody who is a general manager with a doctorate and so on, very impressive, who told them there is no service. The response listed out the service in terms of the disability network team and so on but in respect of respite, there is no break for this family. The HSE wrote to Ability West, which told the HSE it had no respite. We know this because every time I have spoken, I have raised Ability West and the Brothers of Charity. The Brothers of Charity some years ago went to the trouble of outlining the gaps in its services. It pointed out that one of big problems was that there was no capital funding for it to build respite services, in addition to shortages of staff. There was no capital funding for them and no ability to get funding. These services to which we outsource everything rent buildings. They rent from developers in estates so all of the money is short term and short lived. The gaps highlighted in the capacity review and by Indecon are all still there. We are doing our best to tell people, "I know there are billions but I will ask the Minister of State, Deputy Rabbitte". That is what we are left saying. There is no respite for a nine-year-old. That is repeated ad nauseamin the city and county, while millions are wasted on rent. I am over time so I will stop.

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