Letters to the Editor: No dedication to disability supports
One reader says that the pre-18 services for people with disabilities are frequently limited and poor in many areas. Picture: Alamy Stock
Aisling McNiffe (Letters, April 2) offers cogent and coherent commentary on the plight of disability carers, as their children transit across the 18-year-old age threshold, finding diminished care options and dwindled support services.
Hers is a typical dilemma and, even at that, the pre-18 services are frequently limited and poor in many areas. Disability access to appropriate support is particularly found wanting in many areas in Ireland, where even simple physical access for wheelchair-bound people is so often missing, and disability needs are scurrilously overlooked.
Thus, the citizens who are most in need of equitable access and full supportive opportunity are left to wrangle and pester the statutory systems for consideration of basic rights of engagement in social activity, comprehensive, co-ordinated healthcare templates, and as creatively free a life experience as possible.
Considering the shameful waste of public funds regularly squandered on vain and vacuous projects, prompted by vested-interest political lobby groups, it is scandalous the omission of so many basic services for people living with and those caring for disability issues.
It seems that there is no authentically dedicated enthusiasm, by the powers that be, to award disability the optimum level of supportive care it truly deserves — by any measure of assessment of need. While the fiscal purse would appear to be pretty full currently, the propensity for shallow and shoddy lip-service towards disability needs, in the round continues apace. Shame.
We welcome Finance Minister Michael McGrath’s declaration that Irish taxpayers’ money invested by National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA) in the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund (ISIF) will soon be divested from six Israeli banks, identified by the UN as being integral to the Israeli state’s illegal settlements in the Occupied West Bank.
However, legislation is still urgently needed to safeguard Irish taxpayers from complicity in Israeli war crimes. The stated rationale for this week’s decision — that “ISIF has determined that the risk profile of these investments is no longer within its investment parameters” — does not prevent the ISIF reinvesting in these banks in a number of years, if their “risk assessment” changes.
The Illegal Israeli Settlements Divestment Bill 2023 aimed to codify into law the illegality of investment in any entities that are complicit in the illegal settlements. This is not limited to the six Israeli banks cited by the minister, it also extends to a number of large multinationals including AirBnB and Motorola Solutions, as well as numerous Israeli private entities.
Senior Government figures are clearly aware that the electorate wants to see an end to Ireland’s complicity in war crimes, and are throwing a succession of shapes to suit.
An NTMA decision does not amount to legislation, and will not be accepted as a substitute for it. The estimated 100,000 people who march through Dublin for the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign’s monthly national demonstrations demand conclusive action, legislation enacted in Dáil Éireann, and nothing less.
We must continue to press for the enactment of both the Illegal Israeli Settlements Divestment Bill and the Occupied Territories Bill, to finally end our nation’s complicity in gross State-sanctioned criminality.
The new Scottish hate crime laws came under severe criticism from author JK Rowling, who said the laws were wide open to abuse and looked forward to being arrested by the police on her return to Scotland.
This hasn’t happened as the police found no issues regarding her statement.
The SNP, which itself has been mired in controversy, said the new laws will help to stymie the rising tide of hatred. It may have the opposite effect, and could harm the SNP and the Labour Party — who voted in favour of its enactment.
Similar hate speech laws are about to be enacted in this country and have been met with widespread criticism because, like the Scottish laws, it will be seen by many as stifling free speech.
There are also concerns that it will be exploited by certain minority groups and NGOs who wish to silence the majority.
Article 40.6.1.i of the Constitution allows every citizen to freely express their convictions and opinions. However, it can be limited in the interests of public order or morality.
The idea that it takes a Government to enact laws that curtails freedom of expression or open debate, that which we openly and honestly disagree with others about, is a step too far and which negates the majority’s rights.
If I want to openly criticise transgenderism, Traveller inter-feudalism, or migration, will I find myself in the dock?
This overreach by the Government, like so many EU laws, is a form of gag order — one that prevents myself and many others from criticising or challenging that which are seen as contrary to fundamental social norms and morality.
This enactment of this bill, if it succeeds, will be this justice minister’s ultimate swansong and could finally bring the curtain down on this Government’s reign.
To Eamon Ryan:
I was surprised to find that on my bus journey from Cork to Dublin Airport that myself and the driver were the only ones wearing seatbelts. I was further surprised that there was no safety briefing.
While citizens of Ireland may be familiar with the legislation and chose not to comply and wear a seatbelt, this is probably not the case for tourists like myself.
May I ask why there is no safety briefing or written advice on seatbelts usage provided on licensed buses in Ireland? May I suggest that, given the countries recent poor record on road safety, such advice may be advantageous.
Under the current system of electing 49 out of 60 members of the Seanad, Limerick’s sway is one of the lowest in the country.
At the moment, between local authorities and the Dáil, Limerick has 47 electors in the Seanad general elections for 43 seats in the Upper House of the Oireachtas. In contrast, Cork has 105 electors, Galway has 65, Dublin has 228, and Kildare has 48.
One further distinguishing feature between these five counties is that graduates from universities in Kildare, Dublin, Galway, and Cork all hold the right to vote in Seanad elections for six of the 60 seats, despite the electorate voting for reform in 1979 and the Supreme Court that the elite position enjoyed by universities there was unconstitutional.
When the Green Party’s and Fianna Fáil’s candidates for Limerick’s first directly elected mayor are asking the good people of Limerick for their votes, they might have some trouble explaining why their parties in Government have decided Limerick should have one of the quietest voices in electing the Seanad. Why do the three Government parties appear to believe Limerick’s residents aren’t worthy of an equal say?
Those candidates could press their parties to finally progress the Seanad Bill 2020 and ensure Limerick is no longer shunted to the side.
