Micheál Carrigy (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I want to put that on the record. I also want to thank the Cathaoirleach and other colleagues for attending yesterday's event with AsIAm on autism awareness. I welcome the Houses of the Oireachtas initiative that involves all of the parliamentary community taking up autism training. I ask all Members of the Seanad and their staff to take up that training over the next number of months. We want to be one of the first autism-friendly parliaments in the world by the end of December 2023. That includes all 1,500 staff taking part in that training. I urge colleagues to support the initiative.

I also want to raise a few points about carer's allowance. I would like a discussion with the Minister for Social Protection ahead of the budget. Through its work, the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Autism has produced evidence and studies which show that as a State, we are not meeting the significant cost to families associated with paying for services in this area. There is no income disregard for those expenses when it comes to applications for carer's allowance. There are families where one parent may have to give up work, yet he or she is not entitled to carer's allowance because his or her partner is working. There is no income disregard for the expenses of €10,000, €15,000 and up to €20,000 that families have on a yearly basis. They are not entitled to carer's allowance. I would like a discussion with the Minister for Social Protection. It needs to be looked at and a change needs to be made in the budget.

We have discussed the issue of the building of housing. There are numerous people in my own area that travel to and from Dublin to work in construction, whether it is roofing, plastering or bricklaying. There is an issue with the changes in the vehicle registration tax, VRT, charges for vans or caddys. I was chatting to representatives of a company yesterday that is looking to bring six lads to Dublin and provide a van for them. The company has to pay €30,000 in VRT to purchase the van. If the business owner bought two small vans that carry three people, he would pay €200 in VRT. We want to reduce the number of vehicles on our roads, especially where those vehicles are for the building industry. They are not being used for social purposes or for bringing kids to school; they are being used to bring workers to Dublin.