3042. Deputy Eoghan Kenny asked the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality if her Department will publish a five-year national community living strategy for adults with an intellectual disability, prepared jointly by her Department of , the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, the HSE, local authorities and approved housing bodies; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [58856/26]

3043. Deputy Eoghan Kenny asked the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality if her Department will establish a single statutory community living pathway with one point of referral, one co-ordinated assessment process, one named responsible team, clear decision-making timeframes and access to independent advocacy; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [58857/26]

I propose to take Questions Nos. 3042 and 3043 together.

This Government recognises the requirement for a whole-of-government approach to advancing the realisation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, UNCRPD. With that in mind, in 2025, the Department of Children, Disability and Equality published the National Human Rights Strategy for Disabled People 2025-2030, which was developed with strong input from disabled people and representative organisations on the issues that matter the most to them.

One of the key pillars of the strategy outlines the need for a collective approach to housing supports for disabled people. Under this pillar, the Department of Children, Disability and Equality, together with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, is working in collaboration with a number of other Departments and agencies, including the HSE and local authorities.

In line with commitments contained in the programme for Government and the national human rights strategy, the Department of Children, Disability and Equality is now developing a new vision and reform strategy for disability services. This work will be critical in ensuring we can deliver high-quality, flexible, human rights-based services to those who need them into the future.

The strategy will set out an ambitious and far-reaching programme of reform to improve services over time and gives us an opportunity to look at how to fund and deliver services and set in place a plan to reform services to create more effective governance and more efficient systems, to work towards the delivery of more person-centred supports for disabled people.

This new strategy will prioritise early intervention, so we can strengthen planned provision. While certain services may always be required to address urgent and unforeseen circumstances in peoples’ lives, this Department wants to move away from crisis interventions and towards more planned and person-centred provision.

The Department has been working closely with stakeholders on this new reform strategy, including advocacy groups, disability umbrella groups and representative bodies and is working to make the concept of "right support, right place, right time" a key pillar of policy and implementation.

Throughout 2026, the Department is also undertaking research and progressing policy development, with a view to developing a new policy framework for specialist disability residential services. This policy development process will consider a wide range of matters relevant to specialist residential services, including models of service.

The Department is also advancing the development of a policy framework on community-based supports, including respite, home support and personal assistance. These supports play a critical role in enabling disabled peoples’ independence and participation in their communities. The work will also consider the appropriate role of personalised budgets. Engagement with stakeholders, particularly those in receipt of these services, will be an important part of the reform programme under way.

Alongside this significant policy work, significant levels of funding have been provided to specialist disability services in recent years. Funding supports a range of services for people with disabilities, including day services, respite services, residential services, home support and personal assistance.

Budget 2026, saw a funding increase of €628 million, an increase of almost 20% on 2025. HSE Specialist Disability Services now has a record budget of €3.9 billion. Specialist disability residential services make up the largest part of the Disability funding disbursed by the HSE, almost 60% (€2.2bn) of the total budget.

The Department of Children, Disability and Equality is working closely with the HSE to achieve a more balanced response to the demand for residential placements and move towards planned provision and away from unplanned responses where possible. HSE regions are working collaboratively with voluntary service providers in each Integrated Healthcare Area to identify and prioritise individuals, in an effort to ensure plans are in place before a crisis arises.

With the additional funding secured in recent Budgets, new HSE housing coordinators and residential planning and review teams, are planned to be in place this year to coordinate and oversee the delivery of the new residential placements and plan for future placements, many of which will be delivered in Local Authority homes.

The aim of the Residential Planning & Review teams will be to improve forward planning of residential placements, and to ensure that individuals are appropriately assessed in relation to support needs prior to placement in residential services and reviewed in a timely manner for duration of the placement in respect of quality of care and support needs. Work is underway in the HSE to recruit and develop these teams.

Every individual availing of a residential placement has a person-centred plan which can include an onward plan as required, part of the remit of the HSE’s new Placement Planning and Review Teams is to ensure discharge/onwards plans are followed as required. HSE Case Manager’s take responsibility for securing the required resources for prioritised individuals.

Budget 2026 also provides further funding for a range of disability services including €25million in new development funding for respite services, €44.3million for Day Services and €12.09million to expand Home Support and Personal Assistance supports.

Availability of suitable housing is particularly important in the delivery of residential supports. The National Housing Strategy 2022 to 2027 places responsibility for the provision of housing with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage and it is the responsibility of the HSE to provide additional supports related to care needs.

Minister Foley and Minister Browne, along with their officials, have made significant progress, through the implementation structures established under the Strategy, in improving coordination with the HSE, Local Authorities and disability service providers at local, regional and national level.

This includes work to establish the levels of unmet need for specialist disability residential services in each county or local authority area, which will inform the setting of targets in the local authority Housing Development Action Plans (HDAPs) for two cohorts of disabled people: those living more independently in the community, as well as those with greater support needs who will receive specialist disability residential services.

It is expected that the new HDAP’s, which will run to 2030, will be in place by Q3 of 2026. In preparing their HDAP, each local authority will reflect local need to ensure the right mix of homes to respond to local need and priorities.

The Department of Housing will be ensuring through these housing plans that disabled people are getting the social housing allocations to support independent living in the community, including the provision of community dwellings for disabled people requiring a residential placement which have also to be supported by the HSE funding.

I wish to assure you that this Government, along with the HSE, is committed to supporting people with disabilities and their families/carer(s) and will continue to work to provide and expand services to ensure people are provided with the necessary supports at the appropriate time.