Michael Kitt (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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I understand that Deputy Lowry is providing one minute to Deputy Healy. Is that agreed? Agreed.

Michael Lowry (Tipperary North, Independent)
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Over the lifetime of the Government, the experience of the parents and teachers of children with special educational needs has become a serious national issue. Continually muddled Government policies on how to provide for such children, combined with the shortage of resources and non-availability of facilities, consign many to what can only be described as bureaucratic purgatory. These problems are exacerbated by parents being forced to lurch from crisis to crisis as they try to ensure their children receive the basic education appropriate to their needs while endeavouring to locate safe environments. All too often, the parents expend a large proportion of their earnings, not to mention months of precious time, only to find that the services are insufficient or they must wait weeks, months or even years before they can get therapy and support for their children.

With my Oireachtas colleagues, I attended a meeting last Monday in Scoil Aonghusa in Cashel. It is a co-educational school that facilitates 85 individuals with multiple physical, emotional and other learning difficulties. These pupils need immediate specialist services but receive little support or funding from the HSE. I am aware that this is a national issue, but another school in Cashel, Scoil Chormaic, which caters for 223 children and young adults, also faces the constant occurrence of minimal services.

The introduction of the progressive disability services for children and young people, which were established by the HSE to change the way in which services were provided, is a haphazard, unpredictable and Billy-to-Jack delivery of service and therapy. This project will not alleviate any problem. Services need to be delivered consistently, cohesively and in collaboration with parents and teachers. We need to start listening to the parents and teachers who care for these children every day. They are acutely aware of what needs to be undertaken and how the efficient delivery of such services can be fully achieved. Children with special needs should have access to all the specialist therapies and supports they require, not out of luxury, but out of necessity. "Lack of funding for services" is the Government's daily recited turn of phrase, but should we not find that funding? Should funding for children with special needs not be our first priority?

It is evident that the continued chaos in care and services is not the fault of psychologists and therapists. The problem is that their caseloads are too large to meet the needs of so many children. In the absence of services, our teachers are to be applauded for the incredible work they undertake to meet these children's needs and to provide after-school support to parents. We have heard the announcements of additional personnel, but those announcements hide the fighting, pleading and justification that schools and parents must make to get such posts.

Séamus Healy (Tipperary South, Workers and Unemployed Action Group)
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I thank Deputy Lowry for allowing me to say a few words on this issue. The parents of children with special needs are continually under pressure. They speak constantly of having to fight for everything they get.

We attended a meeting in Scoil Aonghusa in Cashel on Monday night. It is a fine school that is offering an exceptional service to its students and support to families. It caters for 85 students. There was an effort to operate on the basis of a multidisciplinary team of teachers providing services including psychology, physiotherapy, and speech and language services, but unfortunately those resources are simply not adequate. The school simply does not have enough physiotherapy, psychology or speech and language hours. Additional hours need to be made available for the school if the children with special needs are to be provided with a proper service.

Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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I thank Deputies Lowry and Healy for raising the matter. The Government is committed to providing and developing services for children with special needs and to improving access by these children to therapy services in so far as that is possible within available resources. As Deputy Lowry will be aware, health-related therapy supports and interventions for such children can be accessed through both the HSE's primary care services and its disability services, depending on the level of need. Significant additional resources have been invested in recent years in the State's primary care and disability services with a view to enhancing therapy service provision. For example, additional investment of €20 million in 2013 has facilitated the recruitment of 260 prioritised front-line posts for primary care teams.

With regard to disability services, the HSE has recognised that its early intervention services and services for school-aged children with disabilities need to be standardised. To this end, a major reform of therapy resources for children with disabilities aged up to 18 years is currently under way. This involves pooling the resources of all service providers in defined geographical areas so that children receive their therapy interventions from multidisciplinary teams. The HSE's national programme on progressing disability services for children and young people from zero to 18 years aims to bring about equity of access to disability services and consistency of service delivery, with a clear pathway for children with disabilities and their families to services regardless of where they live, what school they go to or the nature of the individual child's difficulties.

An additional €4 million was allocated in 2014 to assist in implementing the programme, equating to approximately 80 additional therapy posts. Further investment of €4 million, equating to €6 million in a full year, has been provided this year to support its ongoing implementation. Full implementation of the programme is expected before the end of 2016.

The reorganisation of disability services in line with the Progressing Disability Services for Children and Young People programme is under way in south Tipperary. One multidisciplinary early intervention team has been established. Two teams for children aged zero to 18 are scheduled to be in place next year. These new arrangements will incorporate the existing early intervention service. Disability services for school-aged children in the region will continue to be provided by both the HSE and a range of non-statutory service providers until the new arrangements are in place.

At present, children attending Scoil Aonghusa special school in Cashel receive on-site speech and language therapy during the school term. Three sessions of physiotherapy per week are also provided. I am advised that the HSE south Tipperary community services have met the school's parent representative group on a number of occasions to date to discuss the provision of therapy services at the school. The HSE has indicated that the number of health-related therapy posts in south Tipperary is in line with the national average. The HSE is endeavouring to optimise service provision within the resources available pending the rolling out of the new model.

I assure the Deputy that improving access to therapy services for children in primary care and in disability services is a particular priority for the Government. In this context, further funding of €8 million is being provided in 2016 to expand the provision of speech and language therapy through primary care services and to support the reorganisation and expansion of speech and language and other therapies under the Progressing Disability Services programme. The HSE has indicated that it will further consider south Tipperary along with other regions when decisions on the allocation of this funding fall to be made, including in regard to supporting the full implementation of the Progressing Disability Services programme. I hope that is of some help to the Deputies.

Michael Kitt (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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I call Deputy Lowry. Is it agreed that Deputy Mattie McGrath may have 20 seconds of his time? Agreed.

Michael Lowry (Tipperary North, Independent)
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I thank the Minister of State for her response, however inadequate it may be. At our meeting in Scoil Aonghusa last Monday night, we heard heartfelt appeals for help. Parents and teachers spoke with sincerity, emotion and passion about the consequences for children denied access to therapy services. The parents, who make enormous sacrifices to take care of their special children, are upset, disillusioned and bewildered by the lack of response to their needs. The dedicated and committed teachers who were present at the meeting are frustrated over the lost opportunity to enhance the children's ability arising from the lack of support and assistance from therapy specialists. As far as I am concerned, the necessary structures and systems are in place within the schools. There is no point in removing the children and moving them to centralised locations for the delivery of these services. What we should have is a multidisciplinary team comprising speech and language therapists, occupational therapists and psychologists. This needs to be formed and directly linked to the school.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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I thank Deputy Lowry for allowing me a few seconds to appeal to the Minister of State and the bureaucrats in the HSE. I fully concur with what was said by Deputies Lowry and Healy. The children in question are the most affected in any school. They should be treated where they are and not dragged around the county to clinics that are already full and overflowing and to which people with special needs cannot go. The Minister of State should please show some compassion and human interest in these families.

Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour)
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We have taken advice, but not only from experts. I am not always enamoured with the advice of experts. We have taken advice and engaged exhaustively on how one should deliver a service. I really do accept fully what Deputy Lowry is saying in this instance, but most parents I meet say they are prepared to wait for a diagnosis if offered early intervention. They say that what they want is the intervention and therapy for their children. We are building up the service and ensuring it will continue to be built. The Deputies will know where the service needs to be from the amount of money invested and the posts put in place.

In the recent past, it was a matter of getting the diagnosis and the therapy afterwards. I always believed that was deeply unfair because I might be able to afford a diagnosis for my child while somebody next door might not and might have to wait until her child is five, six or seven to obtain a diagnosis from the HSE. Therefore, we are to put the intervention and therapies in place before the diagnosis. That is a more equitable way of proceeding.

In the past, one nearly had to sign up to a particular service before getting any type of therapy. We are old enough to know that, but we are now saying that if we are serious about mainstreaming children with disabilities, the parents should be able to choose where their children go to school and where they want to live. Therefore, the service needs to be available within their community such that they will not have to sign up to a service. I fully admit that we still do not have the necessary number of staff in place to deliver the type of service I envisage and that parents tell me they want. We are working on that. There will be additional resources and posts in this year's service plan. However, I hear what the Deputies are saying and will make sure that south Tipperary is considered when it comes to the allocation of the new posts.

Mattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent)
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There are 12,500 children waiting.