Tom Clonan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I commend my colleagues in Sinn Féin on tabling this Private Members' motion and welcome the Minister of State to the Chamber. Cuirim fáilte roimhe and I offer my comhghairdeas on his appointment to this very important role.

This set of proposals comes within a particular context. At the moment, for example, there are more than 110,000 Irish children awaiting some sort of service, whether that be physiotherapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy or psychological supports. We have 10,000 children waiting on an assessment of need and we have in our community disability network teams 700 vacancies across the country. That probably informs us to a certain extent what kind of a situation parents like Sarah and Darren are entering. As a parent of a disabled adult myself, unmet need has been our experience for over 20 years now. Last year, Inclusion Ireland surveyed children with special educational needs and their parents and found that, even among those who had a place, for 45% of them, their needs were not being met. We have to be intellectually honest with ourselves and understand that we are coming from a place of failure.

I read Senator Kyne's amendment. We are in breach of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights because our children do not de facto have access to education. Ireland is a developed country. We have a budget surplus. We are a wealthy country. We are also a country that prizes education - the land of saints and scholars, one of the only countries during the Dark Ages in Europe that produced literature, that translated things like the Bible into the vernacular, into Irish. So we are letting down these generations - Gen Z, Gen Alpha. They have been abandoned. We have to approach this coming from that position of intellectual honesty. We are also sorely in breach of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which we fully ratified last October, and we are in breach of the aspirations as set out in Bunreacht na hÉireann when it comes to our children. What makes this cohort of children who are denied these human rights - and I am blue in the face saying this - different from any other cohort of Irish citizens?They have additional needs; they are disabled. Unfortunately, if you are disabled or have additional needs in Ireland, it would appear to be the case that you have less human value in the eyes of the State and of bureaucracy than other citizens. I say that as a father and carer to a beautiful young man who happens to be disabled. I see his fundamental human rights breached and abrogated every day in so many ways. When you hear a diagnosis and discover your child is different, you go, like Alice inThrough the Looking-Glass, into a parallel republic that many people do not appreciate exists.

I want to comment on a couple of lines in the motion set out by Sinn Féin. It states we should ensure that every child currently without a suitable school place and those due to start or primary secondary school shall have access to a suitable school place within a reasonable distance from their home. Last September, over 130 children had no school place, and I assume they still do not. I do not know what the numbers will be for September 2025, but I imagine they will be similar because, according to the research, about 8.56% of our children will have additional needs. Considering that the leaving cert cohort every year is about 65,000, it means 5,000 children coming into the system every year will need additional supports. We need to plan for that.

On the matter of being able to have a school place, my son could not attend the same school as his siblings. He could not go to school with his brothers and sister. I get correspondence, as we all do, from hundreds of parents who are heartbroken because there is no place for their children or they are being offered a place that is an hour and a half away. How can you go to work when you have a child with no school place? We should think about that. How can you go to work, watch a football match? How can you participate in the cultural, economic or social life of this country with the unbearable anxiety and pain? It is trauma, moral injury and moral distress. It is not just the children who are affected; it is their entire families. This ruins relationships. It contaminates the relationships we have with one another and robs parents of their enjoyment of life and their anticipation of the future. With your other children, you do your best for them and hope they will realise their full potential, but when your child has an additional need, you hand him or her over to others. Boy, did they fail us in respect of every aspect of development.

I wish the Minister of State the very best of luck in his portfolio. I echo what Senator Tully said in that I know him to be a man of absolute integrity and know he is passionate about the rights of disabled citizens. I know he will do absolutely everything in his power to advance their cause. However, we really have to be intellectually honest, as we were during the financial crash. Matters should be taken out of our hands because we have thoroughly and comprehensively failed our children. Some of the figures mentioned in the amendment, which I acknowledge is well meaning, remind me of the closing scenes of the film “Downfall”, in which the general staff are presented with phantom units and numbers. Such figures and references to strategies and aspirations will not provide one’s child with a place or the therapies and supports he or she needs.

I have a final question for the Minister. I am sorry I am over time. The educational therapy support service was launched in September and was supposed to have a pilot project whereby therapists were supposed to have been placed in schools. Is it operational anywhere in the Republic? Is there an example of where it is operating successfully?