Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I have only a few minutes to speak on what is a huge issue. I will start by mentioning the public health nurses in my own area and this is an issue right across the country. There is only one such nurse in the Drimnagh area and last year that person was transferred to the nearby area so there was no service. One might ask why this is an issue in this debate. Many young parents start to panic when they cannot measure whether their child is reaching their milestones or whether there are issues involved.

Recently, an elderly constituent had to have very complex dressings done quite regularly and no public health nurses called to the house. The woman is disabled and had to struggle to get a taxi to a local clinic even in bad weather, as was recently the case. She has been hospitalised because of the consequences of being out in the rain. She has had pneumonia and is about to be released only this week with no guarantees still that public health nurses would call to her house. Those are the consequences of what falls upon those who have a disability or who struggle with one.

This is not to ignore the many parents who are also struggling. I have heard people talk about the children's disability network teams, CDNTs, and how great they could be. Yes, they could be great but they are no good if they are not fully serviced because they add to the frustrations of many where if one is promised a service and it is not delivered upon, one can see the child becoming frustrated.

I got a letter from the Dublin 12 Campaign 4 Autism Inclusion only last week expressing huge frustration once again. As the letter said, it is 2025 and we are still in need of autism classes and special school places. It is time for this to be sorted once and for all. This is a group of parents who do have places for the children next September. Each family has been with the National Council for Special Education, NCSE, but again there are no places. Something has to be done for Dublin 12 and it is beyond a joke, as the group has said.

Then one sees cases where complaints have to be made to ensure that assessments of needs are completed or when the assessment of need is done, no services are provided. In the particular case of a young boy of five that occurred in 2022, it was suggested that he needed all of the assessments which were listed but these had not been done by November of 2024. This is a huge area.

I wish all of the Ministers well and whatever help we can give from the side of the House, we will, because at the end of the day we have to deliver these services.

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