Kathleen Lynch (Cork North Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank everybody who contributed to the debate. I welcome the visitors in the Gallery as it is seldom we have a group that stays for the entire debate. Clearly they have an interest in the issue.

I thank Senators Mark Daly and Labhrás Ó Murchú for presenting the Bill. I will start with the bad news and follow with the good news. The Government will not accept the Bill. That is not to say, however, we are against the concept of rights for minority groups being enshrined in legislation. We are not. In principle, that is an aspiration the Government hopes to achieve, but having consulted the deaf community and the senior officials in the Department of Justice and Equality who have responsibility for the implementation plan for disabilities, we fully recognise there are certain issues that need to be dealt with as a priority.

I will explain what we are doing on the implementation plan for disability. I am not suggesting there is a lack of understanding on the matter, but some people may not be fully aware of the plan. When we came to power, the Disability Act 2005 was in place but there was no implementation plan. That seemed very strange to me. How could one ensure people with disabilities in Dingle or Donegal would benefit from the legislation put in place by the previous Government? We set to work on putting an implementation plan in place. An implementation plan is very peculiar. It is a cross-cutting exercise over all Departments and we had to ensure all Departments realised fully their obligations under the Disability Act 2005. We started off by outlining the roles of the Departments of Transport, Tourism and Sport, Education and Skills, Social Protection, Health and others and indicated what action each Department needed to take, the responsibility of the person who took on the role, the timeframe and when we expected it to be implemented. In doing that, we then went to the deaf community asking it to consider where it fitted into the implementation plan. That is very important. Our major concern about a Bill of this type at this time, and I am clearly stating "at this time", is just as Senator Daly has said in his introduction: the right to go to court to vindicate one's rights. We do not want to see scarce resources, particularly at this time of extremely scarce resources, used without the service being put in place. We need to put the service in place before we put the legislation in place. That is what we have done in other areas and that is what we would like to do in this regard.

I was advised when I first came to the job that the high level group on disabilities was a bit constricted, not very active, and perhaps that we should look at a different design. I responded by putting people with disabilities in the groups in order that what they had to say could be heard. That is what we are doing in terms of the deaf community. The meetings we will have from here on in will be themed meetings, such as on housing and disability, and that will include mental health disability, the deaf and people with other disabilities. We specifically articulated that among the disability groups, the most isolated community that had not been listened to up to this time was the deaf community. Having listed to the earlier debate, we came to that conclusion very quickly. We had our first themed meeting in the deaf village in November 2013, which was very constructive and successful.

People presented their cases to us and what they considered to be their priorities. It was an amazing meeting because all the Departments implicated in the implementation plan of the Disability Act were there to listen to what people had to say. There are some key issues. We are awaiting a report from the deaf community telling us what it considers to be its priorities. We will take a serious look at that to see where it fits into the implementation plan.

Clearly, there are issues. One of those issues, which is a serious and maybe a dangerous one, is health, which Senator Daly mentioned. One woman raised maternity services with us. It is not easy, even for someone who is verbal, to communicate rationally in the middle of labour, so how do we manage that in the case of someone who cannot communicate because the other person does not understand? It is not that someone cannot communicate but it is just that the other person does not understand what is being communicated. In the case of a sick child, it is difficult enough for any mother to interpret the symptoms of a sick child and go to a doctor. We are fortunate Senator Moloney is such a good mother and that her son is such a good doctor. The lack of communication worries me, although there is a huge amount in place. When advance notice is given interpreters are available and are paid by the State. However, advance notice is not always given, which can be a difficulty. That is something at which I hope we will look also.

Education is a major issue. Again, not to impose my values on others, we need to have a deeper discussion with members of the deaf community about what it means to them. There is a huge cohort of people for whom Irish Sign Language is their first language and, in some cases, it is the language they use 95% of the time. What does education mean? Are we going to impose the sort of standard of English, Irish, geography and maths? It is a serious issue. How do we manage that in a world where the dominant language is English with a lot of Irish thrown in? I have serious concerns around all of that.

The communication aspect is a huge difficulty. How do we communicate with each other? It is not that the deaf community has a serious problem with communication but we have a problem understanding sign language. It is an issue we need to get right. We need to be able to put in place the services which members of the deaf community need in their everyday lives before we start to put them in legislation and say they have an absolute right to something. The one thing I do not want to happen is what happened a number of years ago in regard to disability, that is, where people go to court to demand those rights and we are playing catch-up to put them in place. I do not think we are divided on this. We all want the same thing, although I do not think much progress has been made.

Those in the Visitors Gallery and those involved in the debate will probably smile when I say that the Disability Act states that everybody with a disability should be mainstreamed. I admit I see huge validity in the argument of members of the deaf community that they would prefer to live together in segregated communities. I understand that better now than I ever did in the past. How do we manage to get over that? Will the next people in the queue, with a different disability, say they want to live in a separate setting? How do I manage all of that? This is about beginning to understand one another and, above all else, the Government responding to the needs of a community I believe has been excluded for a long time, which I do not want to see continuing.

We have the beginnings of a conversation and we need to know the priorities of the deaf community and take cognisance of them. They need to be firmly imbedded in the implementation plan published last year and which we need to ensure is rolled out. Putting legislation first is not the way to go. That is putting the cart before the horse. I think Senator Barrett said we will probably be at that point in the future but we need to put the services in place first.

I refer to technology. One section of the Department of Justice and Equality is funding people to develop an app for Irish Sign Language. That will be a huge advantage because friends of mine who are deaf text all the time and tell me it is a new world for them to be able to communicate without having to write or to ask someone else to communicate for them. The development of an app will not be the only thing in that other pieces of technology will come along which will be of benefit also. However, we cannot assume what is best for the deaf community and we must have that conversation with it. We have begun that conversation and I hope it will continue.

I would say to Senator Daly, which he knows is not something I like doing, that I think this Bill is putting the cart before the horse. I appreciate it because it gives us the opportunity for a discussion. Senator Conway said that perhaps this debate should take place in the Dáil but I do not think it could or that we could have this free-flowing discussion there. I do not think it would lend itself to that in that statements are standard.

We need to have this conversation and I admit it is one we are going to have to continue to have. We are awaiting the report from our meeting of 28 November last. From that, we will find out exactly what the deaf community considers to be its priority and then the conversation will continue.