Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I want to make one or two points at the outset, before making further comments. I congratulate my colleague, Senator Clonan, for bringing the legislation. I know how heartfelt his position is. It is a reasonable proposition. I do not know any Member of this House who is not with Senator Clonan on it and for whom it is not a very real issue. In fact, I know of no family, including my own and every family in the country, that is not affected by this issue. It is not something abstract, and we congratulate the Senator on bringing it forward. I also recognise the Minister of State for her absolute commitment in this area. There is a very active parent's disability group in Cavan and she is aware of it. She has met members of the group at my request, and that of my colleagues, on a number of occasions and not even ten days ago, we had an excellent meeting with her. It was very impressive that she brought representatives from Enable Ireland to the meeting and sought commitments and specific actions on the day. I salute her for that. I also salute the group in Cavan. It would bring tears to a stone to meet the parents and listen to what they go through. It is a wonderful group. My colleague, Senator Seery Kearney, has outlined our party position on the Bill with empathy, ability and great clarity. I would have liked to have been here for the entire debate, but there was a meeting of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence to debate another important issue and I could not avoid that. The issue being debated is particularly relevant to people, but this is a bigger issue.

The Leader of the House has explained that on this side of the House, we completely support the Bill. I have a teaching background and I am the parent of three children. Anyone with normal empathy and normal knowledge supports this and wants action here. What is shocking is that we have these waiting lists. The Minister of State will agree that it is shocking that when people get their assessments and programmes for proposed actions, they are not taking place in real time. It is shocking and it needs to be addressed. That came up at our last meeting, and it will keep coming up. We need speedy assessments, and I think that is improving, but we need the follow-up actions. That is our position. Members will know that the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability and Youth is a regular visitor to this House and is, to be fair, a really sincere and committed Minister. He is for real and he works very hard. The Leader of the House explained that he has requested time on this. We have to take his request in good faith. As the Leader said, we ought to be monitoring this issue constantly. It should be a perennial theme. It would be wonderful if, through the initiative of Senator Clonan and others, this Seanad was remembered as the one that focused on disability issues in a major way, apart from the day-to-day issues. I would like to see that. I echo the fact that we are completely in support of the Bill. I ask Senators to have some confidence in the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability and Youth. He is not a member of my party, so I am not on a partisan rant. He is objectively a decent man who is committed to his Ministry and is very hardworking. In fairness, that cannot be taken from him. If he is looking for time, we have to take him on his word and monitor the situation. If there is no action in a few months, we will come back, change the situation and object then. I ask the Senators to view it as uniting the House behind the issue and giving the Minister the time to respond, with the Minister of State, and monitoring it in a very consistent way.