Letters to the Editor: We had to move to Spain to get a special school place
'We were told that nothing could be done without a formal diagnosis and, once the diagnosis was provided, very little changed.'
I am writing as the mother of an autistic child to share the painful reality many families in Ireland are still facing — a system that continues to fail children with complex needs, even when the signs are clear and parents are actively asking for help.
My daughter was diagnosed with autism and dyslexia at the age of seven by a psychologist who, to this day, remains the only professional who truly saw and understood her, beyond her ability to mask.
From the moment she began school, we communicated the challenges she was experiencing and the support we believed she needed.
We were told that nothing could be done without a formal diagnosis and, once the diagnosis was provided, very little changed.
Because she masked so effectively at school, our repeated and urgent concerns, raised almost daily, about the emotional crises she experienced at home were dismissed.
We were told the issue must be at home, and that the school was already doing all it could.
Despite her diagnosis, she was not offered a place in the ASD (autism spectrum disorder) class, and we were told no further support would be provided.
We applied for a year to other schools with an ASD class and we are still on waiting lists.
She was also not accepted by the children’s disability network team, and primary care psychology services informed us that her needs were too complex for them to meet.
We also underwent an assessment of needs, which was likewise not accepted on the grounds that “the definition of disability as defined in the Act has not been met in this case”.
When her emotional wellbeing seriously deteriorated, she was referred to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (Camhs) but her case was initially not accepted.
Only after contacting government ministers was she taken on but even then, with a nine-month waiting list.
As we could not access therapy through the public system, we attempted to go private but found that the waiting lists were either closed or years long.
After exhausting every local avenue and watching our daughter’s wellbeing decline, we made the heartbreaking decision to relocate to Spain, where her needs were recognised almost immediately.
She was granted the highest level of dependency and a disability.
She now attends a school where she has her own classroom, a dedicated teacher, and regular support from a speech and language therapist and occupational therapist.
This is not just about the toll on our family though it has been significant.
My husband has remained working in Ireland for a year, only able to visit once a month while I have been alone with our daughter in Spain, rebuilding her life, her mental health, and education.
But, most importantly, this is about the long-term impact on a 10-year-old child.
She now faces an educational delay of approximately five years, which is extremely difficult to reverse.
She lives with the psychological impact of having spent years in a system that did not provide her with a safe or supportive environment.
She was a child with visible needs who was repeatedly overlooked, misunderstood, and effectively denied her rights, simply because she masked.
This experience has left her not only behind in her education, but with emotional wounds from being dismissed by the very structures that should have protected and supported her. And sadly, her story is not unique.
It should not take moving abroad or escalating to ministers for a child to be seen. No child should have to reach a breaking point before support is offered. And no parent should have to fight for years, every single day, for their child to receive even the most basic help.
I share this not just for my daughter, but for every other child in Ireland still waiting still unheard, still unseen, and still fighting for the support they deserve.
John Whelan’s article — ‘EU’s €2bn plan to fix shortage of sustainable aviation fuel’, , November 10 relating to sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) — seems a bit optimistic.
The EU will solve the problem of the shortage of SAF by spending €2bn.
This miracle SAF is defined as that made from agricultural waste or used cooking oil.
These products are already used in road transport fuels and some of these will also be in demand for the much heralded production of bio-methane from anaerobic digestion.
Thus the supply of these waste materials is not assured for the voracious needs of the aviation industry.
There are also reports that many existing biofuels in Europe are produced from imported palm oil rather than indigenous waste sources.
The only solution I have seen to produce clean aviation fuel is to use carbon capture from flue gases and to combine this with hydrogen generated from hydrolysis/wind power to produce a sustainable synthetic fuel.
This could be something like methanol but would likely cost six times the cost of the conventional fuel. Michael O’Leary has rightly scoffed at the idea of any form of SAF.
He knows that the customer does want to pay the real cost for sustainable aviation. Thus, is this EU initiative just another form of ‘greenwashing’?
Recently, air travel into Brussels and Liège airport, as well as nearby military airbases, have been intermittently interrupted by ‘uncrewed aerial systems’, drones, most likely controlled by Russian-backed operators.
This has prompted the RAF, France, and Germany to quickly send additional drone defence systems to Belgium.
Ireland is equally, if not more, vulnerable.
Priority has to be given to increasing drone and counter-drone capabilities immediately. Even before considering our presidency of the EU next year, disruption of air passenger and cargo traffic in the build-up to Christmas would have serious commercial and political consequences.
If only in the form of a one-off vote to acquire relatively inexpensive drone defence systems, Ireland must take steps to protect itself. Neutrality is not the same as helplessness.
To those who have, in a sudden flamboyant spasm of patriotism, taken to hanging the Tricolour out of windows in their homes and at their business premises.
Thank you for identifying yourselves.
It is useful to know where that sentiment is situated. Of note, immigrants (of every generation) are your friends, neighbours, and customers.
Sarah Harte believes the recent Vatican doctrinal note on some Marian titles, , will further alienate young people (‘Church’s dismissal of Our Lady as a co-redeemer seems like bad PR’, , November 12).
The Vatican note simply clarifies the meanings of various titles given to the mother of God over the past decades.
For example, the note states, “one must avoid titles and expressions that present Mary as a kind of ‘lightning rod’ before the Lord’s justice, as if she were a necessary alternative before the insufficiency of God’s mercy”.
It continues: “The formula ‘co-redemptrix’ departs to too great an extent from the language of Scripture and of the Fathers.”
If anything, this clarification should help people to avoid the over-exaggerated role and titles often given to her by her over-zealous followers.
These Marian hyperboles, often stated as Catholic teaching, have become a stumbling block on the road to Christian unity.
This doctrinal note will probably do little to attract the younger generations to the Catholic Church.
What is needed is brave Christian witness relevant to pressing justice issues.
What a magnificent event it would have been for Christian witness if Pope Leo had joined Mary Robinson at the locked Gazan Rafah gates highlighting the Palestinian genocide.
After 40 years involved in secondary school religious education I am convinced more than ever that Christianity is caught not taught.
For someone who, in the past, stridently declared that Ireland does not need an army, Catherine Connolly’s inauguration as Uachtarán na hÉireann would have greatly lacked a sense of solemnity, an aura of dignity, and the observance of ceremonial occasion befitting the appointment of our head of State, had the Irish Defence Forces not been present.
I have always been a lover of the Irish language but I struggle with the Official Languages (Amendment) Act 2021 which says that 20% of recruits to the public sector will be competent in the Irish language by the end of 2030.
That means that when you go into your nursing home and a Filipino or Indian nurse is taking care of you, you can exercise your constitutional right to have your healthcare delivered through Irish.
I find this to be really discriminatory against people when it comes to jobs.
This is akin to saying that if you can do your job through Irish, then your application goes into one pile.
That certainly doesn’t sit easy with me.
