Joe McHugh (Fine Gael)

I welcome this opportunity to contribute to this important Bill. I wish to refer to 1997, although I will not use the example of that year as a watershed for a political debate, or 1996 when I became involved in debates on the issue of disabilities through my involvement in the community development sector.

People with disabilities were targeted as an category in respect of which there was a need for redress, a change in legislation and a change in the types of services, if any, offered to them. At that time, as representatives from Border areas will be aware, many programmes, specifically the Programme for Peace and Reconciliation, were in place. That programme was supported by ADM-CPA. Many people working in funding agencies used criteria which highlighted that funding was needed for grassroots community support, not only for people with disabilities but for ex-prisoners and women. At that time women were targeted as a group who were marginalised and disadvantaged. They were granted disadvantaged status in terms of funding on a cross-Border basis. Other groups included Travellers, the unemployed, youth groups, and young people in general.

Such groups were identified through debate for which I compliment the role of the Community Workers Co-Operative which was heavily involved in identifying such target groups. There was real debate, effort and significant time and commitment devoted to identifying how services could be mainstreamed to facilitate disadvantaged groups and how people on the margin could be brought into society. "Social inclusion" were the buzz words at that time and they are still used.

Much has happened since 1996 and the debate on this issue has moved forward. I will use the example of Travellers to illustrate how the debate has evolved. Many people would disagree with the concept of giving Travellers special disadvantaged status simply because they are Travellers. There is the question of the individuality of Travellers as an ethnic group. However, giving a group disadvantaged status can be dangerous in that it can label people and compartmentalise groups. In trying to include people in that sense, one can end up excluding them. In certain instances that happened. Where estates were given disadvantaged status, people started to label them and if crime levels were high in such estates they were branded in a negative way.

The debate has evolved since 1996. I wish to concentrate on the debate because that is what is important as opposed to the political gamesmanship. The debate has evolved to the extent that people, such as disability groups, do not want to be compartmentalised. From people I know who work with people with disabilities and from people with disabilities, with a number of whom I have a close relationship, they do not want to be compartmentalised and classified as a people with disabilities. They do not want to be faced with a situation where special funding is set aside or sanctioned or special privilege is given to the group of which they are a part simply because they cannot mobilise themselves in the same way as the Acting Chairman or me. The debate has gone beyond that point.

The Bill is about the issue of disabilities but it is essentially about providing equality, access and justice to people with disabilities. It is not only about sanctioning on budget day moneys to be set aside for people with disabilities. That is not a measure that sits comfortably with me or with many people involved. I am even finding it difficult to pronounce the word "comfortably" for which I apologise.

We need to examine our mindset as legislators and in terms of the way we treat, view and categorise the person in a wheelchair we meet on the street or the person in a special unit for people with disabilities. From my knowledge of this area, there are two points to note. One is that a person with a disability living in an independent living centre does not want sympathy. If one were to express sympathy to a person in such a centre, that person would react in disgust. People with disabilities do not want sympathy to the effect that one asks them how they are doing or whether they will be able to manage. They do not want to be treated like imbeciles or juveniles. That is the first important point. People with disabilities are human beings and equal to myself, the Acting Chairman and every other person. That is the message we need to get across today.

The second important point to note is that people may make a stereotypical comment that many people with disabilities come across as being angry. There are many angry people with disabilities, and some of them are extremely angry. They can exercise their anger at any given time. If one works closely enough with them, one could feel the brunt of this anger. However, nine out of ten times that anger is not expressed as a result of their disability, although part of it will be and like anybody else they can be angry depending on their mood or state of mind. The anger felt by people with disability is based on the lack of services and access available to them. It may come down to the simple matter of the provision of an appropriate footpath or means by which they can get into town for a pint. We cannot over-emphasise the difficulty faced by a person in a wheelchair who may live a mile from a pub. The social and recreational life of that person is severely restricted. Such restriction can start with that person being in a bed in a centre for independent living and not being able to get out of it because he or she requires a personal assistant who is not available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. That is his first obstacle.

This man I speak of is a good friend of mine. The second obstacle, if he can summon somebody to help him get out of bed, is to call a taxi. Certain urban councils have done great work in making grants available for wheelchair accessible taxis but at peak time on a Saturday night they are hard to come by. It takes a taxi driver a long time to help a person with a disability in and out of his or her cab. When one is in the business of making money one does not have time to waste. This is not a criticism of the taxi drivers.

The next obstacle this man meets is use of the telephone. Some people with disabilities cannot use a telephone. I have contacted people in O2 and Vodaphone to ask them to look at ways to adapt mobile telephones. For those of us with no disability it is easy to carry our telephones around and hold them to our ears. Speaker telephone is an option but there are people who cannot hold a telephone. Some effort must be made to fit telephones into wheelchairs or otherwise help people with disabilities to communicate.

Returning to my example, the gentleman in question cannot get a taxi and decides to go to the pub alone. He must travel on a footpath that may not be passable, or onto which he may not be able to drive his motorised wheelchair. Traffic poses a problem as do crossing the road, access to toilets and returning home. There are numerous problems for a person simply trying to go out for a pint.

If that person has such a problem going out for a pint on a Saturday night, what sort of obstacles does he encounter in accessing services, job opportunities, training opportunities, other social and recreational outlets and participating in the civic responsibilities of his community? We take these matters for granted.

We can get into a car and go wherever we want at any time because access is not a problem. There are more cars than people. Access to services and people is easy. We politicians make ourselves available to people all the time and there are people who can come to us. The main problem in this Bill is that it is impossible for us to quantify the difficulties encountered by people with disabilities.

If a sum of up to €300 million was set aside in a special budget for people with disabilities it would be throwing money at a problem. This is not a question of money; it is a question of individual rights because people with disabilities are the same as the rest of us. Many are smarter and more street-wise than us. We have the disability of being unable to come to terms with people with disabilities. We should put up our hands and say we have this problem. We cannot understand what it is to be without choice.

If I may digress somewhat, one of the arguments in the debate on suicide is that young people have too much choice. Perhaps they do. I know I do. People without disabilities have so much choice they do not know what to do. There is so much we can do during the day, so much entertainment is available, so many challenges are open to us, and we have many options to choose from for a weekend. We have choice at home and abroad. People with disabilities do not have choice. They are limited in what they can do, when, how and with whom.

People in the Disability Federation of Ireland say that assessment of need, whether in terms of health or services, should not be resource dependent. That is the key issue to highlight in respect of this Bill. The Disability Federation of Ireland states:

—The services identified in the assessment of need for an individual must be provided within a reasonable and agreed timeframe;

—The Bill must provide for clear protection of disability specific resources;

—The provisions regarding Sectoral Plans must take account of the wider needs of people with disabilities. Each Government Department with relevant services must provide a Sectoral Plan.

Monaghan County Council and Donegal County Council do not meet their public service obligation to make 4% of their jobs available to people with disabilities. I name those counties because Donegal was at the bottom of the list and Monaghan was on the list. I doubt there is a local authority in Ireland that meets the 4% criterion. If there is no sectoral plan and there are no monitoring bodies to deal with this matter it will not be implemented.

Thirty years ago people saw council workers with their shovels every two miles along an old country road cleaning siocs and drains. Now they look around and see only one digger or one man and a shovel. One does not see council workers on the ground. They are all indoors, doing office jobs, sitting at desks. A person with a disability can sit at a desk. Many people with disabilities are qualified and well-motivated enough to be pen-pushers in any local authority. They can do as much pen-pushing as the next man or woman.

My party opposes the Bill on the grounds that those involved in the disability movement do not feel it is right. We must change the mindset by which we compartmentalise people with disabilities. We must constantly remind ourselves how difficult it is for a 42 year old man to go for a pint on a Saturday night. If it is difficult to go for a pint it is extremely difficult to attend a training course or take up a job. It is difficult to go on a training course and become competent and later discover there is discrimination in regard to employment. St. Thomas Aquinas said: "Never let the perfect be the enemy of the good." People with disabilities are not looking for perfection, they are looking for their rights. We should try to look at the good and examine our conscience in regard to the Disability Bill and provide for some of the issues highlighted here.