John Dolan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Budget 2017 has bypassed people with a disability and there is no drive out of the recession in it for them or their families. Recently, I called on the Taoiseach to put in place a €300 million package to support people living with disabilities, chronic ill-health, special needs, etc., and their families. He indicated afterwards that it would not happen, and it has not happened. I made the case that this modest but significant funding could be put to best effect by being targeted where it was most needed across rural and urban areas by children, young people, adults and older people. That has not come to pass simply because a deliberate decision has been made and executed in the budget.

The slide rule of populist support was run through every line and every page of this budget. There is no brave opening up of hope for the 600,000 people with a disability and the 200,000 carers in this State. I said to the Taoiseach last Thursday week that disability brings poverty. It deepens poverty, brings exclusion, and marginalises. Where is the start of a fairer Ireland, which we are told is one of the themes running through this budget, for these people and their families? The Government could have started down a different road today, but it deliberately chose not to do so. We should think of parents struggling to cope with disability and probably also trying to support their parents, or being thankful that their parents are fit and able to be of support to them. These are the real squeezed middle in Ireland today.

There will be an extra 56,000 to 60,000 people with disabilities by this day next year. All the analysis and the talk tonight and tomorrow will be about the winners and the losers and who has more income than they had before the budget - the single parent with two children, the two people on modest incomes, the professional, etc. - but that will not be the case for those newly diagnosed or those who currently have disabilities. No matter what extra few bob is in their pockets as a result of the budget, they will still be big losers because the services are not there.

There was some focus on disability, but will the 21,000 social housing units include appropriate accommodation for over 1,000 people with disabilities next year? Where is the €30 million fund to assist in housing adaptations? Will the €497 million increase in health spending restore the €159 million that was taken out of disability health services and other areas during the recession? There is no funding to provide for the extra daily cost of living with a disability. What was sought was an investment of €20 per week. People of working age, older people and people with a disability are being given €5. How are we to be happy about that? Should we have been left behind when others got the extra fiver? The extra cost of disability is not there, although the preschool provision for children with disabilities will ensure that they are not excluded from now on and that is to be acknowledged.

I acknowledge the medical card coverage for children on domiciliary care allowance and I acknowledge the home care credit, yet the intent in this budget was to do something rather than take the real opportunity to make a focused impact with the funding available for those with disabilities. How is it that throughout Ireland so many people struggling on a daily basis can still count for so little? Populism has trumped public benefit at the end of the day in the Budget Statement.