People Before Profit Calls On The Government To Act Speedily To Implement Its Motion To End Poverty For People With Disabilities And Their Carers

This morning in the Dáil, People Before Profit-Solidarity introduced a Disability Justice motion for debate and at midday the motion was passed unanimously.

The motion included a call to scrap the Government’s Green Paper on Disability Reform and was submitted to the Oireachtas before the Government’s decision to scrap it. Critically the motion called for the scrapping of means tests for disability and carer allowances, for a universal cost of disability payment, and for immediate ratification of the Optional Protocol to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

People Before Profit member Bernard Mulvany, a leading member of the ‘Scrap the Green Paper’ coalition of disability activists, said “The scrapping of this Green Paper on Disability Reform is a massive victory for disability rights activists and people power. The proposals represented a ruthless discriminatory attack on people with disabilities and it is fantastic news that the Government has been forced to back down. Now that our motion has passed, the Government is obliged to implement all the provisions of the motion as a matter of urgency”.

People Before Profit spokesperson, Bríd Smith said “Our motion also called on the Government to end poverty for people with disabilities and their carers. The motion has just passed in the Dáil, so the Government must now act quickly to introduce a system of non-means-tested universal payments that cover the real costs of having a disability and provides adequate and secure income to disabled people and introduce a guaranteed non-means-tested living wage for carers”.

People before Profit Deputy Gino Kenny said “Our motion also called for a massive expansion of personal assistance hours to ensure that there is personal assistance to all who need it to study, work, socialise and live a full life. We also called for a guarantee that all personal assistants have decent pay and conditions. Speedy Government action on these important issues is now needed to implement our motion”.

People before Profit Deputy Paul Murphy said “Last September I asked Leo Varadkar if he had seen the film ‘I, Daniel Blake’ which tells the story of a middle-aged man in the UK who is denied social welfare despite being declared unfit to work by his doctor. I asked that because the Government’s Green Paper on Disability Reform was out to make this film happen in real life in Ireland by copying the Tory policy of the work capability assessment. In response to me, the then Taoiseach said he did see the film but added that it was “one-sided” and he said “There are other programmes, like ‘Benefits Street’ and so on which show a very different picture. Of course, as is always the case, the truth lies somewhere in between”. That response shows exactly how Fine Gael and this government regard people with disabilities, and I salute the disability campaigners who faced the Government down”.

People Before Profit Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett said “We also need to change the model for the allocation of special education resources so it is based on trusting teachers and parents and school communities to define the resources they need for all the children with additional needs. A huge number of our schools are not getting the resources they need to cater for all the children with additional needs. This has been made worse for many schools by the new allocation method recently brought in by the department of education with one third of schools losing special education resources for 2024/25. The Government must act immediately to address this growing crisis”.

Deputy Bríd Smith said “Our motion also calls for immediate ratification of the Optional Protocol to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and for a constitutional amendment to assert equality for disabled people and to guarantee for all the right to supports needed to fully engage in society as a basic democratic right”.

She added “We are pleased that our motion has passed unanimously in the Dáil today. But this will count for nothing unless the Government acts. We now call on the Government to act speedily to end poverty for people with disabilities and their carers”.