Billy Timmins (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Question 1204: To ask the Minister for Transport the position regarding disabled persons parking discs for parents who have children with mild autism if they qualify for same; if not, if they can be put on the list; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2430/07]

Martin Cullen (Waterford, Fianna Fail)
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The Road Traffic (Traffic and Parking) Regulations, 1997 empower local authorities, the Irish Wheelchair Association and the Disabled Drivers Association, to grant a disabled person's parking permit to a person who is suffering from a disability that is of a nature that prevents him or her from walking or causes undue hardship to the person in walking. The focus of the qualifying criterion is therefore on the issue of a person being a wheelchair user or having significant mobility impairment. Eligibility has to be determined on a case-by-case basis having regard to the nature of the mobility impairment of the person. The position is therefore that children with autism are ineligible to be issued with a disabled persons parking permit unless the child also has a mobility disability and is unable to walk. There are no proposals to extend the application of the disabled persons parking permit scheme to include persons who are not mobility impaired.