Pauline Tully (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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317. To ask the Minister for Health the way that his Department defines a disabled persons' organisation; if this definition conforms with that of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46432/22]

Pauline Tully (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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318. To ask the Minister for Health the way that his Department defines a disabled representative organisation; if this definition conforms with that of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46433/22]

Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 317 and 318 together.

Ireland ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) on the 20 March 2018. This marked an important milestone in a process to strengthen the rights of people with disabilities in Ireland that has gathered momentum since Ireland became a signatory to the Convention in 2007. Every Government department and every agency is responsible for ensuring implementation of the UNCRPD.

Disabled Persons Organisations are ‘representative organisations’ within the obligations contained in the UNCRPD. Under UNCRPD Article 4(3), states parties are obliged to consult closely with and actively involve representative organisations in the development of law and policy. States parties are also obliged to give representative organisations a role in monitoring processes.

The Department of Health engages with a range of disability representative organisations in ongoing discussion of policy and resource matters through channels such as the Department’s Disability Consultative Committee, and through direct consultation, in order to ensure the voice of people with disabilities is heard in matters affecting them.

In its work to prepare a Disability Action Plan to advance provision of additional capacity in specialist community-based disability services, in September/October 2021 this Department also undertook wide-ranging a four-strand consultation with representative disability organisations and with individuals with lived experience of disability to inform that work. This included an online consultation event, two in-person consultation events for disability service users, written submissions from the national disability umbrella groups, and an online consultation survey. Overall around 800 individuals took part in this consultation process.

The Health Service Executive also has standing consultations with disability organisations through its Disability Consultative Forum.