Irish Wheelchair Association (IWA ) members from Athlone, the Midlands region and across Ireland marched on Leinster House to present its pre-budget submission to Government.
Concerned IWA embers and employees gathered to plead with the government to ‘hear our voice’ and ‘not abandon people with disabilities’ in Budget ’24.
One of the key issues of concern centres around pay parity for section 39 workers which is already having a detrimental effect on vital services as IWA struggles to retain and recruit staff who are leaving to work for the HSE where they are getting paid better for doing the same job
The cost of disability, housing, independent living and transport access are also key issues.
“We are urging the government to provide full pay restoration for Section 39 organisations and a return to alignment with HSE pay scales,” on pay parity, National Advocacy Manager, Joan Carthy, said.
Athlone based Irish Wheelchair Association, Service Manager Monica McGowan Hughes warned that daily services and in particular assisted living services throughout the country are being hit hard due to government inaction on the issue and it is a real worry.
“We know that 1,300 young and middle-aged people with physical disabilities across Ireland have been forced to live in nursing homes because of the lack of wheelchair accessible housing and also because of the lack of living supports. Many disabled people need support to live independently such as personal assistants, our assisted living service. Without these services young and middle aged people are prevented from living an independent life,” Ms McGowan Hughes stated.
Take the case of *Alex and *Zack, two young Irish Wheelchair Association members who moved out of nursing homes in 2022 with HSE funding secured from the Wasted Lives Report in 2021. Both have done very well since moving to their own homes and have a much better quality of life. However, due to staff shortages, they are very worried and fearful that a situation would occur that they would end up having to return to live in a nursing home.
In this particular situation, two staff members have left Irish Wheelchair Association and taken up employment with the HSE. HSE personal assistants are paid a higher rate for doing the same work. IWA’s recruitment campaigns in the area are unyielding. There are lots of other similar challenges around the country, compromising the services IWA provides and the health and wellbeing of the people they support.
As the voice for its 20,000 strong membership living with a physical disability across Ireland, IWA is making 33 key recommendations in its comprehensive pre-budget submission across seven pivotal areas - sectoral funding, personal assistants, housing, transport, day services, social protection and sport.
These include:
*Publish an action plan for the Disability Capacity Review and invest money to resource it.
*Provide funding to section 39 organisations to achieve pay parity in line with HSE workers.
*Amend Part M of the Building Regulations which currently only provide for wheelchair visitable housing and not wheelchair liveable resulting in homelessness for people with disabilities.
*Immediately progress the review of the Disabled Drivers and Passengers scheme.
*Change the allocation of funding from Community Employment Schemes to core funding.
*Establish the principle of a cost of disability payment. Budget ‘24 should not be passed without implementing the findings of this report.
*Provide additional funding to support the IWA-Sports performance programme which would enable our athletes to compete at the highest levels.
The latest data from Census 2022 shows that 22% of our population (1,109,557 people ) have a disability of some extent and that this generally increased with age – from 4% of people aged 0-4 years to 76% among the over 85s.
“Ireland needs to plan ahead to ensure that people with disabilities get the right services, in the right place at the right time. People want choice not charity,” Ms McGowan Hughes, Irish Wheelchair Association, Athlone, concluded.
