Claire Kerrane (Roscommon-Galway, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate the Minister on her appointment. As my party's spokesperson on children, I look forward to working with her.

Before I begin, I take this opportunity to mention an issue I have raised a number of times regarding the recent storm and its impact on people with electric wheelchairs and those who are reliant on electric beds and certain medical devices. Unfortunately, I feel I am hitting against a brick wall. Our most vulnerable people, who were on the vulnerable customers list, were left at sea during the storm. There was no priority. There was nothing for them. Their place on the list was, frankly, irrelevant. The ESB tells me to speak to the HSE and those responsible for disability in terms of my ask for generators for people reliant on medical devices. I appeal to the Government to look at this. We can never again have a situation in this State where our most vulnerable are left totally isolated and on their own. We will have more storms. In that context and on behalf of our most vulnerable citizens, I ask that the provision of generators to those reliant on medical devices be considered by the Government. Unfortunately, it will not be considered by the ESB.

I want to focus specifically on children with disabilities and those with additional needs. Sadly and for a long time, children with additional needs in the State are being failed each day, whether as a result of waiting lists for assessments of need, primary care or CDNTs. I have met parents whose children were getting a bit of a service from the Brothers of Charity previously, but the rug was pulled entirely from them when the CDNTs came into place. In my area, it has been a real struggle to staff the teams. This is still an issue. Children have been left with nothing. They had been getting little support but now they are getting nothing. Their parents have to watch them regress and see the impact it has on their development.

We know that for any child being on waiting list is detrimental to their development and to their well-being. We have more than 13,000 children on waiting lists. Children are waiting for first contact from CDNTs. More than 9,000 of them have been waiting for a year. Similarly, there are record levels with regard to waiting lists for assessments of need, with more than 14,000 children currently waiting. More and more parents are struggling. They are battling the State and taking legal action against it. This is totally avoidable. We need the Government to give serious priority to and to take action on reducing these waiting lists.

I want to raise a recent communication from the HSE that came to my attention last week. This was a communication to parents whose children are on the waiting list for assessments of need. This letter asked the parents to let the HSE know if they still want to remain on the waiting list and stated that if it did not hear from them by a certain date, they would be removed from it. Parents have enough to deal with, particularly when they have children with additional needs and when everything in the State is a battle, whether it is in the context of education, therapies or access to supports. I wrote to the Minister and to the Minister for Health asking them to make sure that no child is removed from the waiting list because a parent did not respond to a communication from the HSE. It would be great to see the HSE put effort into tackling the waiting lists rather than, as we have seen previously, trying to find ways around the legislation and the six-month requirement and, now, putting it back on parents by stating if it does not hear from them, they will be removed from the waiting list. It is not acceptable and it is not the way that parents should be treated.

Recently, I was made aware that child and adolescent mental health services, CAMHS, do not accept private assessments when it comes to accessing supports. I know of parents have paid for private assessments, even though they did not have the money, and who then went to CAMHS. In a particular case, a child was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and CAMHS said that supports could not be provided because the diagnosis was made on the basis of a private assessment. When parents opt for private assessments, we have to have a bit of leniency and make sure they can get supports on the back of that those assessments, particularly where they have been waiting too long on the public list.

There are major issues more widely in counties Roscommon and Galway with regard to respite. I received an email from a parent on respite. The tagline was "respite plea". Parents are begging for support in terms of respite waiting lists in Roscommon and Galway. I would like to see moves on respite and care for parents.

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