The Irish Wheelchair Association says that last night’s powerful Prime Time Report, “Access All Areas” confirms that people with disabilities are not just being left behind by successive Governments, they have been abandoned.
Four brave people shared some of their daily struggles with the nation and it’s still only a small but significant insight into how people with disabilities have to fight for equality and just to keep their heads above water.
“It’s time for the leaders of this country to take a stand and stop sleep walking into one crisis after another” said Joan Carty, the National Advocacy Manager with Irish Wheelchair Association.
“At Irish Wheelchair Association we have heard time and time again from our members that it’s not a person’s disability that disables them, it’s society. “We saw that clearly in last night’s Prime Time programme. It’s not good enough that people are living with these struggles, these are not demands or additional needs, they are a human right.”
Ireland ratified the United Nations Convention for Persons with Disabilities in 2008. There are many articles in this which cover access to housing, society education and work to name a few. Today, there is still no action or resource planning towards implementing any of the articles.
Irish Wheelchair Association represents 20,000 people with physical disabilities across communities in Ireland and delivers personal assistant services on behalf of the HSE and have campaigned for may years, in the national budget for additional personal assistant hours, to no avail.
This issue is further complicated by the fact that personal assistants within Irish Wheelchair Association and other Section 39 organisations, are paid a lower rate of pay than that of their HSE colleagues. Until Government address the pay issues the situation will continue to worsen.
One in four people in Ireland are living with a disability and with an aging population the likelihood is that will increase. Irish Wheelchair Association are calling on Government take action today and to stop abandoning people with disabilities.
