HSE unit spent over €12,000 before Lynch visit
Grove House, located on the grounds of St Mary’s orthopedic hospital in Cork, is a closed unit for 30 people who have an intellectual disability, autism or challenging behaviour.
The unit has long been deemed an inappropriate living environment and has been criticised for being an old-style institution operating a medical model.
Following negative media coverage on RTÉ’s Prime Time and in the Irish Examiner, minister with responsibility for disability, Kathleen Lynch, visited the unit in July.
Ahead of the minister’s visit, more than €12,400 was spent on new furniture, pillows, plants and shrubs and garden furniture.
The Irish Examiner had been told about the purchases in the days before the minister’s visit.
The HSE denied this, saying there was an “ongoing and rolling refurbishment” programme for Grove House involving the replacement of damaged furniture. It would not provide figures or details.
Documents received under the Freedom of Information act show exactly what was spent:
* €10,470 on furniture.
* €713.86 on plants and shrubs.
* €720 on garden furniture.
* €284.63 on pillows.
* €236.63 on a special shower seat.
Units such as Grove House — and all services for the intellectually disabled — have no independent inspections and are the last to remain un-inspected.
Grove House first came under fire in 2001 when the Irish Examiner exposed the unit’s living conditions which were described as depressing. Family members are forced to visit in a tiny room and the institution’s culture has not changed.
Deirdre Carroll of campaign group Inclusion Ireland called Grove House “isolating, institutional and enclosed”, while ex-MEP and disability campaigner Kathy Sinnott said visiting it was one of the saddest experiences of her life.
Successive governments have pledged to end the practice of placing disabled people in these settings.
In 2001, then minister for health Micheál Martin announced a “complete programme” to transfer people with intellectual disabilities in psychiatric hospitals to appropriate accommodation by the end of 2006.
However, many institutional settings are still operating and about 4,000 people live in them.
