Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats)

Does the Tánaiste not see something fundamentally wrong with producing a budget that leaves disabled people €1,400 worse off, pushing disabled people even further into poverty? It was a €9.4 billion budget package and that is what the Government produced. That is a huge problem that it needs to address now. For years, the Government has promised a cost-of-disability payment but where is it? We have had years of promises on this. There was huge disappointment in the disability community that there was no permanent cost-of-disability payment this year when the Government abolished the temporary supports.

The removal of the disability support grant is regressive and shameful. The budget "locks disabled people and their families into another cycle of exclusion". Those are not my words; they are the words of the Disability Federation of Ireland. Will the Tánaiste listen to disabled people? Will the Government introduce an emergency winter payment, which is needed now? When will it end the talk that has been going on for years about a cost-of-disability payment? When will it actually introduce it?

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