The story for people with disabilities continues to worsen year after year. Access to therapies is simply appalling and respite care and opportunities for work for people with disabilities are very poor. The assessment of need statutory rules are continuously breached, but much worse is happening. I could go through a whole range of services for people with disabilities which are very poor indeed.

The latest survey on income and living conditions, SILC, data reveals the deterioration in the numbers of people with disabilities who are out of work due to illness. The situation has deteriorated between, for example, 2014 and 2015. There was a significant increase in the number of people with disabilities at risk of poverty, from 25% to 34%. The consistent poverty rate increased from 14% to 22%. The Taoiseach knows that living in poverty and social exclusion is difficult, but it is particularly difficult for people with a disability.

I refer to the assessment of needs under the Disability Act. At the end of May this year, there were nearly 4,120 children waiting longer than the three-month statutory rule for assessment.

The Taoiseach knows that delays in getting assessments mean delays in interventions and this compromises the future development potential of any child in terms of their well-being and their future lives. We have now reached the stage where families are launching an action against the State to compel it to assess their children within the statutory guidelines.

We also know that the Government scrapped the mobility allowance and the motorised transport grant in 2013. An interdepartmental group was established. The Taoiseach was Minister for Health at the time and probably had some knowledge of this. The Minister for Health was given responsibility for bringing in a new scheme for people with disabilities. We have been waiting for the new scheme for four years and seven months, longer than the duration of the First World War. There is no excuse for this inertia and lack of progress.

In terms of essential therapies, particularly occupational therapy, the assessment waiting lists have surged by nearly 50% in two years. A total of 29,600 individuals are waiting, of which 6,800 have been waiting over a year for an assessment for occupational therapy. The figures up to the end of May show an increase of 9,000-odd over the 2015 figure. The largest cohort consists of those under 17. Nearly half of people on that list are under 17. This is only for assessment. We all know about the long delays in terms of subsequent intervention and the provision of services and that those involved in disability are very disillusioned by the response in terms of the disability strategy and so forth. Does the Taoiseach acknowledge that things are bad, that they are getting worse for children, teenagers and people with disabilities and that there is an urgent need in the forthcoming budget and the Estimates to once and for all tackle this unacceptable blight on our society?

I acknowledge absolutely that there are lots of shortcomings and problems and that plenty more needs to be done. This is something that will have to form part of the budget and the Estimates process. I am sure we will find additional funding for disability services next year, as we did last year. On behalf of the Government, I want to say that we are very much committed to improving the lives of people with disabilities, supporting their families and providing more opportunities for people with disabilities.

The Deputy mentioned some of the shortcomings and failings. It is also important to balance that by acknowledging some of the progress that has been made, particularly under the leadership of the Minister of State, Deputy Finian McGrath. Examples include a €90 million increase in the budget for disability services last year, which was very significant; a 34% increase in people with disabilities accessing higher education, which is very welcome and has happened over the past number of years; the first increase in weekly payments for people with disabilities, the blind, the incapacitated, invalids and their carers in eight years as a result of the previous budget; the full restoration of the carer's support grant in the budget prior to that; and real progress on medical cards, which is hugely important. Any child with a severe disability whose parents must provide domiciliary care is now entitled to a medical card by right. This has provided an extra 10,000 medical cards for children with disabilities while 40,000 are no longer subject to reviews. This has been very much welcomed across the country.

Other decisions include the fact that somebody receiving disability allowance who takes up work keeps their free travel for five years while the requirement that the work be rehabilitative has been abolished. There are many other examples I could mention. It is important to acknowledge progress and the fact that more progress needs to be made and that more needs to be done in this space. There will always be more work to be done. That is why we have Governments. Disability will be taken very seriously in the Estimates process, the budget and the service plan for the year ahead.

There is a very disappointing complacency - almost a smugness - in the Taoiseach's response to issues of this kind. It is now standard practice and a mantra whereby the Taoiseach will just itemise what he sees as positives and so on but will not deal with the hard questions that are asked. If one asked the basic question about access to therapies for children, teenagers and indeed older people in any county in this country, the answer would be that they are appalling.

The Taoiseach did not respond at all to the figures I outlined there and the crisis in access to assessment of need as per the Disability Act and with regard to getting proper services in occupational therapy, speech, physiotherapy and much more. It is not a good story. We can describe many cases. For example, there is one involving parents of a four-year old child who was referred for assessment in 2015. The child was assessed 14 months later. That is criminal with regard to that child's potential development. Another child of seven years of age was referred in 2014 and the parents were told that no funding was available for services. Parents are being told by the services to complain. Another child, aged six, was aged two when diagnosis was applied for and four when diagnosed.

The Deputy's time is up.

There are other such cases. Parents of a nine-year old child in a similar situation were told that no services were available. Those parents really do not want to hear the Taoiseach, Minister for Health or Minister of State with responsibility for disability reeling off statistics. They are fed up with rhetoric and publication of a strategy which Senator John Dolan has said has no targets.

Back me up in the Estimates.

They are fed up.

They are on the list.

The Deputy's time is up.

I am not worried about backing up the Minister of State.

I told the parents' lobby-----

I thank Deputy McGrath.

I am interested in the families who are at the end of their tether-----

Now is Deputy Martin's chance.

-----and who really want-----

Support and services.

-----to get beyond rhetoric and beyond strategies, and want real services for them on the ground. They would expect the Minister of State, Deputy Finian McGrath, to deal with it-----

-----and the Government as well.

The Deputy is way over time.

I assure the Deputy that I am just as interested in people with disabilities and their families as he is. I do not think any party in this House has a monopoly on compassion and I do not think any party in the House should claim to. I assure the Deputy that everyone on these benches, both Fine Gael and Independents, is doing their best to assist people with disabilities through constituency work and through our work as Ministers. Many of us have people with disabilities in our families so I do not think, in this House, we should engage in some way in trying to make out that some party or group has a monopoly on compassion because it is just not true.

Nobody ever claimed that.

I do not accept that my response is complacent. I am just offering balance and accuracy and if I can acknowledge that there are failings and shortcomings, surely Deputy Martin should be big enough to acknowledge that there has been progress as well? Everything I itemised is genuine progress and has really happened. To mention the sort of thing that is being done in the budget this year, there is a €1.688 billion budget for social care. Some 8,400 residential places will be provided, 182,000 respite overnight care nights, 1.4 million personal assistance hours for 2,400 people with disabilities and 24,800 day places, 41,000 day respite sessions, decongregation is happening at pace and people are being moved out of institutional settings and into community houses though not as many as we would like or as quickly as we would like-----

It takes up to two years to get an assessment of need in Cork.

It takes up to two years.

Genuine work is ongoing. I am willing to accept that there are shortcomings and-----

We are not talking about shortcomings, but a crisis.

-----failings. More progress will be made and I guarantee the Deputy that more progress will be made in the years ahead but it is disappointing that the Opposition is unable to acknowledge any progress that has been made, which is substantial, and I gave examples which are certainly not made up, and I encourage people to check them.

It is disappointing that the Government does not understand its failings.