I wish to raise a matter that affects the responsibilities of every Member of the House because we can all to some extent share in the blame for the death of a mother of six young children. Susan Maher, God rest her soul, was killed last Monday while travelling home to Kilkenny. I extend my sympathies to her family.

Susan Maher rose every morning at 4.30 to drive to Dublin, returning home at 9.30 p.m. She had to do so because of the lack of speech therapy facilities for her child. The failure to deliver such a service shames us all. The Minister for Finance is today in a position to do something about this. Last year the former Minister for Education and Science waved a blank cheque, yet health boards are refusing to hire private therapists. It means that parents of children like Bobby Maher are being forced to drive huge distances to have their rights vindicated and to avail of facilities. In the context of the Constitution, under which we all operate, this failure diminishes the responsibility and the capacity of the House to do its job.

The budget is to be announced today and the Government is in a position to narrow the gap between the "haves" and the "have nots". In view of this, I ask the Taoiseach and the Minister for Finance to ensure that an attempt is made to vindicate these rights and to provide the necessary facilities to those concerned.

I join Deputy Kenny in extending our sympathy to the family and extended family in Kilkenny of Susan Maher following her tragic death. It took several hours to cut her son Bobby from the wreckage of the car after it went into a drain late at night on a dark road in Kilkenny. We all hope he will recover.

I understand from reports that Susan Maher left home between 4.30 a.m. and 5 a.m. to drive to Dublin. In addition to looking after her other children she was anxious that Bobby would be able to avail of speech therapy. She was killed near home on a road she knew well. After a long day it is suggested that she fell asleep at the wheel. That is understandable for a woman who pushed herself to the limit. I understand she was travelling to a party of one of her children and was then to have collected her husband. All in the House extend our sympathy to her family.

The shortage of paramedical staff is not confined to the Carlow-Kilkenny region. Many people throughout the country drive long distances on a daily basis to the national service centres in Dublin, Cork and Galway. It is a hard task and it is why, over the past five years, we have provided big increases in funding to hospitals and services throughout the country. Many hospitals are under construction.

Earlier this year the former Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Woods, and the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Martin, announced the provision of extra therapy training places for students in Cork, Galway and Limerick to tackle what has been an acute shortage of speech and occupational therapists and physiotherapists. The Estimates for this year provide more than €650 million extra for health services, but unfortunately, in this case a speech and language therapy service was not available.

The Government has identified the shortages and has created additional places in the colleges in an attempt to provide more services on a regional basis. I hope those students attending courses in speech and language therapy at University College Cork, the National University of Ireland Galway and the University of Limerick will improve the services available. That does not detract from the tragic death of Susan Maher.

This tragedy highlights and underlines the difficulty to which the Taoiseach alluded. Prior to June of this year, 75 places were promised to start in September. Twenty five of those places were between UCC and NUI, Galway, and 50 postgraduate places for speech therapy and special language teachers in the University of Limerick. These courses have not yet commenced and this makes a mockery of Government commitments. Arising from the tragic and unfortunate case of Susan Maher, will the Taoiseach and, in particular, the Minister for Education and Science, give an assurance that this commitment will be honoured and that these places will be available as soon as possible? In so far as is attainable will the Minister for Finance, even at this late hour, adjust his statement to make some effort to deal with the rights of parents of disabled children and those with special needs? These difficulties are of grievous concern to parents. Yesterday was the international day of the disabled and I ask the Taoiseach to recognise that and the difficulties faced by parents.

The shortage of speech and language therapy services has been a difficulty for some time. The Mater Hospital is my local hospital and until recently there was only one speech therapist for its enormous catchment area. That situation has changed because the health boards and the Department of Health and Chil dren have been involved in a number of recruitment initiatives including sponsorship of an overseas recruitment policy. For the past five years overseas recruitment has been filling these posts.

Deputy Kenny is correct. Our initiative introduced earlier this year doubled the number of therapy places available. It was expected that the intake for language therapy studies would have commenced in September or October at the start of the academic year. For whatever reason and it was not because of a lack of resources, that did not happen. I do not wish to participate in a blame game but it has not proved possible and it is now expected that the courses in Cork, Galway and Limerick will start in the academic year of 2003-04. My information is that the Galway and Cork courses will commence then and the Limerick course may have already started. This area has been recognised by the Government, the resources are available and we have put an action plan in place. There will be more students and we have also recruited significant numbers from abroad.