Budget 2024: Cork mother and disability advocate ‘saddened but not surprised’ by budget

A CORK mother and member of a disability advocacy group has said the Government has shown “a complete lack of understanding of the needs of people with disabilities and those that support them” in this year’s budget announcement.

Rebecca O’Riordan of Families Unite for Services and Support (FUSS) and mother of a child with additional needs in Cork said that FUSS is “saddened but unfortunately not surprised by the latest budget”.

Yesterday, the Government announced €64m for investment in disability services to deliver more than 90 additional residential places; 1,400 day places for school leavers; increased personal assistance hours; and rate increases for staff providing home supports.

Minister Paschal Donohoe announced an increase of €12 per week for an individual in receipt of social protection payment and a once-off double week cost of living support payment to all qualifying social protection recipients.

He also announced an increase in the carer’s allowance means test to €450 for a single person and €900 for a couple.

Speaking to The Echo, Ms O’Riordan said: “This Government has shown again and again a complete lack of understanding of the needs of people with disabilities and those that support them.

“An increase of €1.50 a week for domiciliary care allowance on the eve of an all-out strike of services is degrading in the extreme.

“The Government’s own cost of disability report states the average cost to a person to be in the range of €9,000 to €12,500 per year. That’s the cost of simply being disabled, not the cost of food, rent, or bills.

“Means testing of carers payments means that many family carers around the country will not even receive the €12 increase on carers payments but for those that do, this will equate to a per hourly rate of €1.50 an hour.”

She said carers and people with disabilities are “experiencing a rate of State-sanctioned poverty while we sit on billions in excess”.

“We are being bombarded by ads for UN convention on the rights of people with disabilities, bus stops emblazoned with disability rights are human rights while we remain one of the worst countries in Europe to be a person with a disability.”