So, when is a U-turn not a U-turn, Dr Reilly?

DISABLED people are valued and respected by the Taoiseach and his Health Minister — but only as long as they are in London winning medals at the Paralympics, and not making a nuisance of themselves at home by demanding basic levels of dignity.

Enda Kenny has spent the week banging off messages of congratulations to gold, silver, and bronze medallists at Olympic Park in Stratford, gushing about how “fantastic” the disabled competitors are and how the nation “cherishes” their achievements.

If James Reilly’s cack-handed €10m personal assistance care cuts had gone through, would congratulatory messages have gone out from Government Buildings to vulnerable and elderly people in Tipperary or Clare thanking them for remaining in soiled adult nappies for several hours because there was no one available to help them anymore? Because that would have been the grim reality of the cuts that were so cavalierly imposed by the Coalition.