Appeal to send autistic boy to Wales

DISABILITY rights campaigner Kathy Sinnott yesterday set up a fundraising appeal to send an autistic child to a specialist centre in Wales.

The appeal was launched outside the Four Courts after the High Court ruled that Annette and Colm O’Carolan did not have to pay legal costs in taking a case against the State.

The O’Carolans lost their case last week after Justice John MacMenamin ruled that a centre in north Dublin fulfilled the State’s obligations regarding the education and care of Lewis.

The O’Carolans rejected the Woodlawn centre, saying it offered “psychiatric care”, and wanted their 14-year-old son to be sent to an autistic centre in Bangor, Wales.

The Dublin couple said Lewis was not psychiatrically ill and that if he went to Woodlawn he would end up being drugged and deprived of the behavioural intervention he needed.

Mr Justice MacMenamin yesterday granted the O’Carolans the cost of their legal bill, estimated to be in the region of €300,000.

Ms O’Carolan described the costs order as a little recognition of what the family had been through.

But she described as “appalling” the State’s policy towards people with disabilities. She said there were hundreds of parents taking cases similar to hers.

“What the State does is delay them in red tape and legal delay, so by time the child is 18 the damage is done and they have no obligation. The State is then laughing up its sleeve.”

Joining her outside the Four Courts, MEP Ms Sinnott said a fundraising appeal was being set up to send Lewis to Bangor.

“The Government has failed. When they fail you go to the courts. The courts have failed to protect Lewis, so we’re going back to the people of Ireland. We’re asking the people of Ireland to give, to send Lewis to the school that is appropriate to him.”

She said the State was willing to accept any offer, including a gym room, as adequate for Lewis’s education and care.

“No child in this country is safe if adequate can mean anything. What happened to Lewis will determine what happens to other people.”

The O’Carolans are still pursuing a case for damages against the State for its failure to provide for Lewis’s education to date and are still considering whether to appeal last week’s decision.

The Lewis O’Carolan Appropriate Education Fund bank account number is 93863613, sort code 90-29-79.