Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein)

I will raise a few issues. The first relates to carers. I have been contacted by several people who applied for the carer's allowance over the past year or 18 months. They found it difficult because their lives have been dominated by a person in their home to whom they need to give almost 24-hour care, yet they get nothing. They have not a hope of getting anything because another person in the household works and has an income. It is unfair. They made very strong points about the amount of care they provide. In one case, the person will probably need to go into residential care in the next ten or 15 years. They would not be able to cope with being at home with the person they are caring for because they are ageing. The State will then have to pay for all the care but now it will not even assist with the care this person delivers at home. The issue of the means test for the carer's allowance is the one thing I know the Government needs to look at urgently. It must ensure something can be done to resolve the issue.

The second issue I raise relates to the disabled person's grant for work on the home. There is a huge problem in that respect. Local authorities in most cases do not have enough money to get the work done and there are issues with the rate at which people can apply for the grant because of income in the household. There is another issue in regard to the mobility scheme, which has gone on for many years. This concerns people who want to get a car or adapted vehicle to bring someone in their home who has a disability to hospital appointments, for example, or a disabled vehicle for themselves. It is a huge problem that has been left unresolved for, I think, more than a decade. Something urgently needs to be done. While some progress has been made, we are a long way from resolving many of these urgent issues for people in dire need.

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