Written answers
Thursday, 29 May 2025
Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth
Disability Services
David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein)
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506. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the estimated cost of implementing the Action Plan for Disability Services, by measure, by year, in tabular form. [28596/25]
Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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The Action Plan for Disability Services 2024-2026 represents the first phase of implementing the recommendations of the Disability Capacity Review to 2032. It sets out a range of actions designed to provide better access to disability services. It intends to maximise the impact of service delivery through strategic change and to enable better planning and management through improved information and systems.
The planned improvements require additional investment which would see current expenditure grow by 25% over the 2023 levels indicated in the three year Plan. Furthermore, the planned expansion of residential services will require significant capital investment in order to provide the necessary housing. It is important to note that, since the publication of the Plan, the cost of service provision has risen and the scale of the uplift required to meet targets has increased in tandem. Funding for the Action Plan is allocated on a year-to-year basis through the annual Estimates process.
In 2024, the Action Plan was supported by €72 million in New Development funding to provide extra residential services, day service places, new personal assistance hours, further de-congregation, and new therapy assistant posts for children's disability services.
In 2025, €42 million in New Development funding was provided for New Developments. This funding will deliver:
- 40 new therapy staff and 20 new therapy assistants for Children’s Disability Services
- Between 1,250- and 1,400-Day Service Places for school leavers
- Circa 70 new priority one residential placements
- 21 moves from congregated settings
- In the region of 4,060 additional overnight respite sessions and 8,000 day-respite sessions
- 95,000 additional PA hours
- 40,000 hours additional Home Support hours
It is intended that this Action Plan will be a living document, which may be periodically reviewed and updated in the light of progress, or new issues on the horizon that need to be addressed. Informed by the feedback from the Action Plan Monitoring Group, the Ministers will consider at the half-way point what further measures or changes would need to be incorporated in the Action Plan. Furthermore, it is intended that a successor Plan will be developed for the post-2026 period.
Progress to date on the Action Plan is captured in progress reports which are published at the link below. A report detailing the full year progress in 2024 is nearing completion and will be published soon.
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