Pat Buckley (Cork East, Sinn Fein)

I welcome this opportunity to speak on the strategy this evening. The aim of this national human rights strategy for disabled people is about ensuring disabled people are supported and empowered to live a full life.

I will touch on a few issues. Regarding transport and mobility, the strategy commits to taking the whole journey approach. I have raised it here through parliamentary questions on a couple of occasions. Even with the current transport strategy, there is no wheelchair access or lifts on the railway lines to Cobh, Fota and so on. We are talking about encompassing and empowering people. We have a lot of beaches in east Cork, such as Inch, Ballycroneen, White Bay, Ballybranagan, Youghal and Ballycotton. That is our secret and we do not like to tell anybody about it, but there too there are very few ramps. The beaches are not wheelchair accessible.

I welcome the fact that this strategy is coming, although maybe a bit late. I want to turn back to the part where the strategy states at the start that we want to ensure that disabled people are supported and empowered to live a full life. I have raised on a couple of occasions the case of Katie Byrne, who is from Cobh. On 24 September this year, she will be 15 years waiting for a hip operation. I have her file with me. The Taoiseach was talking about it today. I note the thickness of the file. I have gone to three health Ministers and one disability Minister on this. This girl is still waiting for the operation and is classed as disabled. I heard the Taoiseach say today that is a clinical decision here and they will have to look at it. I will quote, without mentioning any doctor's name or anything, from the very latest medical report that Katie Byrne got here in Ireland. I will not even mention the county. This professor said:

While I appreciate the local surgeons concerns, I can assure you that this will not set her back from walking. She will be up out of bed using a walker within a day or two of surgery. Her muscles will work better due to the improved hip mechanics so they will seem stronger not weaker.

We are on about empowering people and letting them live their own full lives. As I said, I have been dealing with this family for the past two years but this poor girl has been waiting 15 years for a hip operation. I have had, as I said, three health Ministers here and we cannot get answers. I am using this opportunity to appeal. There is an old saying. We all have parents and they say, "Doctors differ and patients die." This poor girl has been suffering for 15 years. I am appealing to the Minister and the Minister of State tonight. If they want this national human rights strategy for people with disabilities to succeed, they have to take these cases individually and they have to think outside the box. As I said, while some people's opinions may differ from others, the job is here. No matter what it costs and no matter what the opinions are, it is about doing the right thing. I appeal to the Minister to look at this case and use this human rights strategy as a template to do the right thing.

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