Phil Prendergast (Labour)

I move:

Seanad Éireann notes that, in addition to severe cuts in allowances for young persons with disabilities, the recent Budget Statement contains a significant number of measures affecting children with disabilities;

Seanad Éireann further notes that children with disabilities are more prone to hospital visits and therefore are likely to be disproportionately affected by the increase in accident and emergency charges, the increase in hospital bed fees and increases in medical insurance costs;

Seanad Éireann believes that it is essential that children with disabilities have access to mainstream education for as long as possible and that in this regard, class size is an essential ingredient of success for both the teacher and student. Seanad Éireann further believes that the increase in permitted class size from 27 to 28 per teacher will adversely affect every child's education, but most especially those with disabilities;

Seanad Éireann deplores the deferring of implementation of the Education for Persons with Special Needs Act, together with the 1% cut in funding for voluntary disability bodies which comes on top of an already implemented 1% cut to the same organisations by the Health Service Executive; and accordingly Seanad Éireann calls on the Government to reverse these unacceptable cuts forthwith.

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Moloney, to the House and thank him for coming to listen to the important contribution our party will make to the debate on this motion.

There is a realisation throughout Ireland about what exactly the budget announced recently will mean. Its true effects will not be felt until January and will continue to be felt for quite some time thereafter.

The Labour Party's motion is not about refusing to face up to economic reality; it is about the Government's failure to face the truth about our economy. When there were countless revenue streams that could have been tapped to address the growing budget deficit, the Government instead decided to increase household costs and to slash services. While the external causes of inflation are easing, the budget has caused hyperinflation in the cost of rearing children. There will be increases in health care charges and decreases in allowances and eligibility. Parents are being asked to pay more for less, especially for their children's education. The budget silences one piece of Government rhetoric for the rest of its term — however long that will be, none of us knows. No longer will we hear about going forward because the budget is about going back.

Despite the Government's claim to be fostering a knowledge economy, it has spared no-one when it comes to education. Third level students who were to be the immediate drivers of our economic growth have been targeted through increased costs. Second level pupils, who are due to enter the workforce throughout the next decade, now face bigger classes with fewer resources and the high possibility of being sent home because of loss of substitute teachers. Perhaps the worst affected of all are primary and preschool children. The Government has obviously decided the smaller the person the bigger the target. Those with special needs are the biggest target of all.

One of the many thousands of four year olds to be victimised by this malicious budget is the Education for Persons with Special Needs Act. This Act of 2004 was to give every child with special needs a statutory entitlement to an individual education plan, but the Minster for Education and Science has now decided to scrap it. How will autistic children get the tailored education plan that will help them participate fully in society in the years to come? The Minister for Education and Science will tell us that he will implement the Act sometime, but when it comes to rights for the disadvantaged, the track record of this Government is that it will never be implemented.

I want to pose a question to the Government parties on behalf of those who will be hit hardest by their lack of foresight and fortitude. What have they done to deserve this? Parents, especially those with special needs children, are asking that and other questions. For instance, how will children with Asperger's syndrome get the attention they need at school when class sizes are to increase and their hours with special needs assistants are to be cut? Why are these children being targeted when what they need most is a teacher's patience? That finding is research-based. How can teachers give that extra help with the added pressures they are soon to face, bearing in mind that they are already under pressure? What about the requirements of preschool children with special needs and those from disadvantaged backgrounds? I know many of those, as I am sure does everybody else. What are they to do now that the Centre for Early Childhood Development and Education has been abolished? That centre did great work, especially in my constituency and it is well recognised that the developing models for helping children with special educational needs were excellent. What did these tots do to deserve having their chance of a fulfilling life being put at risk? Parents are asking what they have done to deserve this.

My inbox is full, as I am sure are those of other Members, of angry e-mails from parents explaining the effects of these cuts at the coalface. One in particular I received is from an adult who had unrecognised learning difficulties in childhood. Tellingly, she wrote that her problems started in infancy. I received another e-mail from a parent who moved her dyslexic son to a school that provided special reading classes and his reading improved greatly after a year at that school. She is now seriously concerned that his achievements will fall back. It looks like his chance may have been stolen from him, which is a great pity.

Is it any wonder the Government abolished the educational disadvantage committee that advised it to reduce class sizes? The Government has admitted in the budget that it is not being fair to children because it has abolished the giving children an even break programme. The budget has filleted the programme for Government published only a year ago. It promised 350 extra language support teachers and instead schools will lose some of those teachers. Immigrants who have contributed to our economy through their taxes and all that goes with it will have to watch on in despair as their children struggle in oversized classes to even understand, much less keep up.

I received correspondence from a teacher advising me her school will lose three English support teachers, leaving just two to cater for the needs of almost 100 children for whom English is not their first language. What have the parents of those 100 children done to deserve this? These parents are not the ones who did not know how to do their job and therefore appointed giant unaccountable bureaucracies to do it for them. They do not have the luxury of passing on responsibility, but soon they will have the expense. These mothers, fathers and guardians, who built their lives around their children, are paying for the irresponsibility of those who built their lives around their bank balance.

That is what the budget is really about — defending the privileged at the expense of the vulnerable. The Government criticises those who want these cuts reversed. It believes our economic interest is served by creating disadvantage and worsening our educational system. Labour disagrees. We say that investment in a good and inclusive education system is a down payment on our future economic success. While the Green Party used to agree with us, it no longer does or at least its leadership does not. These cuts will create higher drop-out rates, increase disadvantage and damage our competitiveness. However, this coalition thinks the same short-term thinking that got us into this mess will get us out of it. When it comes to the economy, it is the Government that needs an education.

I have just read with interest the Government amendment. I note the Government is congratulating itself and commends the significant increase in the number of therapy professionals employed by the HSE in recent years in areas such as speech, language and occupational therapies, physiotherapy, and psychology who deliver services to those in need. In the boom times I had the most horrendous job to get a special needs assistant for a child with juvenile diabetes. He was an insulin-dependent diabetic requiring very careful monitoring of his blood-sugar levels three times a day. As he did not have a special needs educational assistant his mother needed to attend the school to administer his insulin after testing his blood-sugar level. That mother subsequently became pregnant and because of her obstetric history her delivery was required to be by caesarean section, which invalidated her to be covered by insurance subsequent to the delivery and therefore she could not drive. It went down to the wire of the week in which she was due to deliver before we finally achieved it. That was in the good times. I cannot understand the Government commending itself on the significant increase in the number of therapy professionals. I have requested parliamentary questions to be tabled regarding other cases, the nature of which might identify people. Therefore I must acknowledge that people have a right to privacy.

I know the Minister of State, Deputy Moloney, is a caring man from my experience of him as Chairman of the Joint Committee on Health and Children. I know he has compassion. The cutbacks will hurt people greatly. When this debate is over the parents of children with disabilities, who will be further disadvantaged and shoehorned because of the cuts that are coming down the line, will still go home and need to deal with their disabled children. They will still need to put those children to bed and get them up at night to be taken to the toilet or given assistance in all the things we as able-bodied people take for granted. These people cannot speak for themselves. We need to reconsider what we are doing and I call for support for the Labour Party motion this evening.