JOINT COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND SCIENCE debate -
Thursday, 20 May 2004

National Disability Authority: Presentation.

Chairman

I welcome representatives of the National Disability Authority and the Department of Education and Science and I apologise for delaying them. On behalf of the committee I welcome, from the National Disability Authority, Ms Claire O'Connor, director, Mr. Donie O'Shea, senior policy and public affairs adviser, and Mr. Emmet Bergin, policy and public affairs adviser. From the Department of Education and Science, I welcome Ms Pauline Gildea, principal officer, and Mr. Peter Kelly, assistant principal officer.

Before we begin, I draw the attention of witnesses to the fact that while members of the committee have absolute privilege, the same privilege does not apply to witnesses appearing before the committee. Members are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice to the effect that they should not comment on, criticise or make charges against a person outside the House or an official by name or in such a way as to make him or her identifiable.

I call on Ms O'Connor to begin the National Disability Authority's presentation.

Ms Claire O’Connor

My presentation will be based on 15 slides which will be visible to members of the committee. The slides provide a context for the work of the National Disability Authority. The NDA's policy paper is called Towards Best Practice - Further Education, Training and Employment. I will talk about what the NDA is doing and the context for its reports. I will discuss the conclusions of the specific report we are discussing today - the report on further education, training and employment - and I will outline the way forward.

The NDA is an independent statutory organisation, which was established by the National Disability Authority Act 1999, and started its work on 11 June 2000. It is funded by the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform. Its mandate is to develop policy as it affects people with disabilities. It is charged with funding and conducting research on disability issues and developing standards and codes of practice to be promulgated throughout the public sector.

The definition of "disability" in the 1999 Act reflects a social model of disability. It refers to any impairment of people with disabilities that impedes their participation in social, economic or cultural activity. The definition is broad as it relates to any past, current or future impairment. It includes latent disabilities. It is considered a progressive definition. The definition is not used to frame eligibility for various programmes. It is, in effect, a social model of disability.

The NDA's second strategic plan will run from 2004 until 2006. Its core values, which have been carried forward from the first strategic plan, are promoting a rights-based approach, working in partnership with all public agencies and parties and focusing on quality services for people with disabilities. The plan's priorities are to develop policies and practices that reflect and promote the equal status of people with disabilities, to maximise accessibility in public services, to change attitudes in Irish society and to develop quality services. The NDA is working on a project to develop national standards for disability services, as funded by the Department of Health and Children. The project is in its late stages and will have a significant effect on the lives of people with disabilities.

The report, Towards Best Practice - Further Education, Training and Employment, is being promoted in the strategic context of the forthcoming disabilities Bill. The report is one of a series of three reports covering further education, training and employment, health and transport. The reports set a baseline for the NDA's work and ensure that people are aware of the current primary legislation and the policy documents that feed into the Government's stance. They are filtered from a disability perspective. The reports are the first documents to cut across the sectors and to come at the issue from a disability perspective. It was timely to produce the reports as we commenced discussions on the forthcoming disability Bill. They will feed into the sectoral plans that are expected to appear in the Bill.

The NDA has produced a research-driven review of legislation, current policy and quality and quantum of service in each of these areas. It has made recommendations in each of the policy areas. It has made 29 recommendations about further education, training and employment. I wish to refer to the key findings of the report before the committee. We need to examine the current commitment and actualisation of mainstreaming, to comment on the benefits trap, which has been widely commented on previously, to examine service provision in the areas of further education, training and employment, to assess the various schemes and the gaps that exist and to comment on the issues of access of people with disabilities to the various programmes that are offered in the mainstream.

I wish to discuss the findings and conclusions of Towards Best Practice - Further Education, Training and Employment. There is a compelling need for a comprehensive needs assessment. We need to track and monitor the pathways for the progression of individuals through the system. All the reports mention that there are large data deficits and gaps in information. We have done a great deal of work with the Central Statistics Office on a framework for collecting disaggregated social statistics. We have had a large input to the disability side of such statistics. A great deal of ground work has been done in that regard.

Regarding the specific needs in the areas of further education, training and employment, eight recommendations were made in the national policy area. The report mentions the need to drill down on the data deficits. We need information on how people with disabilities get into various programmes and how they move to the least restrictive placement, in the most open and supported way, to allow them to be economically active and to participate to the maximum of their abilities. It is known that many people are in wrong placements as a result of gaps in service provision.

It is necessary to consider the international perspective. Many of Ireland's active employment measures can be compared to those in other countries. We have compared Ireland to four countries in this report. Ireland does not have programme offerings for the self-employed. One could ask if our society is entrepreneurial in the same way as Canada, the US, etc. The marked gap in that area may be accounted for by a broad gap. It is important that employers measure the level of participation in enterprise of people with disabilities.

The need to reduce the benefits trap is an old chestnut that has come up several times. The Department of Social and Family Affairs needs to adopt a multi-departmental, cross-cutting, walk-through approach to try to determine how various measures interact from the point of view of the service user. The community employment scheme is an example of the perverse action of incentives. It was introduced as a transitional employment measure. People with disabilities are over-represented on the scheme because the benefits trap worked to their advantage. Benefits were not pulled and the flexibility of the community employment scheme allowed people with disabilities to participate. It is natural that people will gravitate to the scheme that offers the best mix of benefits for them. When the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment and FÁS agreed to reduce their commitment to the scheme, however, the disability sector was adversely and disproportionately affected. Perhaps the bodies did not reflect on who was availing of the scheme.

Regarding the areas of legislation and regulation, the report comments on the setting of targets, such as the 3% quota for the Civil Service and the public service. We have to make such targets real by monitoring them. I will speak about the transposition of the EU directives. The Equality Bill 2004, which is going through the Dáil at present, incorporated the framework employment directive, race and gender. The NDA welcomes the Bill because it broadens the definition of reasonable accommodation to disproportionate burden. It places a greater burden on employers to make such an accommodation.

The old chestnut of comprehensive needs assessment is referred to in the submission for the disabilities Bill and each of the sectoral reviews we have carried out. Data collection must be consistent. There are four recommendations in this area. Definitions should be standardised where the responsibilities of Departments intersect to facilitate the measurement of progression on a uniform basis. We welcome the implementation as part of the strategic management initiative of the equality proofing template, which we support fully. Disability is one of the nine grounds in the template.

We are calling for the implementation of the code of practice on sheltered occupational services. An interdepartmental committee produced a report submitted 18 months to two years ago which teased out the definitions and differences between rehabilitative places and placements with the characteristics of employment and which should therefore have the protections of employment status. Embedding the monitoring of intake, progression and outcomes in standards work involves collaboration among health boards, the Department of Education and Science and FÁS.

To place these issues in context, there are currently 2,557 rehabilitative training places funded by the Department of Health and Children. The budget for 2003 was €32.7 million. Under FÁS, the disability ring-fenced budget is €56.2 million from the 2003 appropriations. Of a total 5,022 placements, 3,118 relate to employment and 1,904 to training. In total, a budget of over €80 million encompasses approximately 7,500 places, with one third for the Department of Health and Children and two thirds for the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment. These details do not include figures on youngsters over the age of 18 in educational placements. I am aware that we are meeting the Joint Committee on Education and Science rather than any other committee of the Houses.

The last group of recommendations centred on accessibility issues. We must facilitate access by people with disabilities, their families and carers to information for service users regarding the choices open to them. There is also an issue of access to buildings. The premises in which people with disabilities carry out their activities must be accessible. There are broader access issues to do with physical transport and content of available information which are the subject of a great deal of work being carried out by the National Disability Authority through the public service accessibility scheme.

The final recommendation in the report is on training for service providers. The entire system requires disability awareness training for front-line staff as part of the strategic management initiative customer service programme. Everybody should receive some form of disability awareness training.

The findings of the National Disability Authority are not out of step with numerous reports published by the Department of Health and Children and the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment. We will meet officials from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment and FÁS to discuss the detailed recommendations. The Department has conducted its own review, as has FÁS, and certain action plans will be brought before the board of FÁS for approval in late 2004. It is expected that the disability Bill will include provisions on comprehensive needs assessment. Until the Bill is published, we will not know what its provisions comprise.

My key message is that Government policies supporting mainstreaming should reflect the mandate to which the National Disability Authority is working. People with disabilities should have the least restrictive placements possible and be empowered to the greatest possible extent. Society should accommodate people with disabilities to allow them to live life to the full. They should not be segregated but rather given access to the same choices as everybody else.

Ms Pauline Gildea

At the outset, I will define further education as supported by the Department of Education and Science, following which I will discuss accessibility issues for people with disabilities. Within the context of lifelong learning policies, the conceptual frameworks for further education, adult education and vocational education and training are becoming inextricably linked. Developments at EU and national level are facilitating greater co-operation, co-ordination and cohesion among Departments with responsibilities in these fields and statutory bodies with responsibility for delivery at regional and local level. These bodies are primarily the vocational education committees and FÁS. These developments include the new national framework of qualifications, consultations on quality assurance and validation processes by the Higher Education and Training Awards Council with providers and developments within the vocational education committee sector on adult education provision, which includes the appointment of community education facilitators. These developments are aimed at achieving a quality of further and adult education which will be accessible to all, including people with disabilities.

The principal providers of further education, adult education and vocational education and training are the VECs and FÁS. Other statutory providers at national level include Fáilte Ireland, Teagasc and Bord Iascaigh Mhara. Adult education and vocational education and training are also provided by the institutes of technology, universities, a range of private higher and further education colleges, professional bodies, employers and trade unions. Within that broad context, I wish to narrow consideration of the responsibilities of the Department of Education and Science in this field. It is the policy of the Department to ensure that available educational resources are targeted at the most disadvantaged people at all levels of the system. The objective is to ensure that all young people complete first and second level with a high quality education and related qualifications to support their full participation in society and the economy.

A number of further education programmes funded by the Department are operated and managed primarily by the vocational education committees. National certification is provided by the Higher Education and Training Awards Council. The principle objectives of the measures and programmes funded by the Department are to meet the needs of young early school leavers and to provide second-chance education for adults and vocational education and training opportunities for labour market entrants and re-entrants. These objectives are pursued through Youthreach, senior Traveller training centre programmes, the vocational training opportunities scheme, the back-to-education initiative, adult literacy and community education schemes and post-leaving certificate courses.

It is the Department's policy, within an equality context, to seek to encourage and facilitate the participation of people with disabilities on programmes offered in the further education sector. It is acknowledged, however, that while further education programmes are open to people with disabilities, the supports required to enable them to access these options are in need of further development. Generally, issues of access for individuals to further education programmes are addressed at local level with assistance from the Adult Education Guidance Service.

Within the context of moving ahead and developing the possibilities for integration of people with disabilities, the report of the National Disability Authority has already mentioned the research commissioned by the Department of Education and Science in 2002 from the Association for Higher Education and Disability, AHEAD. The Department requested AHEAD to conduct research into the participation rates of and provision for students with disabilities then studying within the further education sector. The purpose of this research was to provide some base-line data on the participation and experiences of students with disabilities throughout the sector and to inform strategies for future development of services within the VECs throughout the country.

The research showed that participation of people with disabilities was at its highest, at 9%, in the vocational training opportunities scheme, VTOS, and next highest in adult literacy programmes. However, the overall participation rate in further education programmes was of the order of 3%, based on the data at that time.

As a result of the research findings, an action pilot project was developed in a number of further education colleges in the Dublin area under the auspices of the City of Dublin VEC and supported by the Department of Education and Science. This pilot project was and continues to be supported by two disability support officers, with support also from the National Training and Development Institute, and the Department provides, through the VEC, flexible additional supports for transport, equipment, interpreters, etc. This service identifies and offers supports to students and staff in the area of disability. The provision of awareness raising sessions and participation in college open and recruitment days is also an integral element of the role of the support officer. The work of this particular project is being monitored by the City of Dublin VEC and we would hope that it can be transposed into the frameworks of other further education colleges around the country.

The Department has provided an annual budget to support guidance, counselling and psychological services for young people in the Youthreach programme. Youthreach centres use this budget to prioritise a spectrum of needs ranging from initial orientation and guidance and vocational information to psychological services. The vast majority of centres prioritise counselling and psychological services as the key gaps in their areas, with the other aspects of the service being delivered by staff within the centres, by mentors in the youth service or by the FÁS advocate service, which has been mainstreamed. Therefore, there is a link between the Youthreach service within the Department and the provision within FÁS. It is a joint programme supported by the two Departments.

Another initiative within the further education area which will support all people seeking to access adult education and further education, including people with disabilities, is the development of the adult education guidance service. There are 25 projects located throughout the country with the aim of providing a quality educational guidance service for adults. The White Paper on adult education and the national development plan provide for the development of an adult educational guidance service to meet the needs of clients in adult literacy, VTOS and community education. This service is supported by the National Centre for Guidance in Education, which provides technical support for projects and co-ordinates the monitoring and reporting of developments. It is a relatively new service and is evolving and developing all the time. There is an extensive representation on the steering committee from across a broad spectrum of interests.

The key objectives of the service are to provide comprehensive information on adult learning opportunities in a format that is accessible to everyone; to develop national specifications and standards for a national website of learning opportunities, which would be locally updated and accessed on a local, institutional, sectoral or programme basis - this is aimed at all people, including those with disabilities; to provide a telephone helpline service, as well as ICT information points in libraries and community education services; and to provide a foundation level of guidance and counselling free for all participants - it has been mooted in the White Paper that there would need to be a charge for participants requiring more intensive levels of follow-up and support.

In the context of information provision, a pilot project commissioned by the Department on the development of an adult learning database is almost completed and we expect it will be presented to us shortly. That will inform the ongoing development of the information needs.

In so far as indicators are concerned, data available within the VECs on adult literacy provision for 2003 indicate that 27 out of the 33 VEC literacy schemes throughout the country made provision for persons with disabilities. The back to education initiative, BTEI, statistics for 2003 show a figure of 15.3% of participants classifying themselves under disability when asked to identify the target group that best describes them. This is quite a large participation rate of persons with disabilities. It is indicative of the flexible nature of the back to education initiative and the opportunity it offers to people who might not otherwise engage in further or second chance education. Providers have referred to considerable demand, often from voluntary groups and other associations which until now would not have had an opportunity to access funding for their client groups.

There are currently two special schools receiving funding under the BTEI for courses for former pupils who are now either in employment or have left full-time education. In some centres useful initiatives have also been introduced in conjunction with the health boards to provide education for people who need support to function outside long-term residential care. In other cases the BTEI providers are working in conjunction with organisations that provide support for people entering employment for the first time. The participants are offered work experience as part of the BTEI course. It is a diverse and flexible course, with a diverse range of provision.

In so far as the significant issue mentioned by the National Disability Authority is concerned, there is a deficit in the capacity to gather all of the data and present them in a manageable format which can inform in a broad context the development of policy. It is the Department's intention to develop a further education management information system to enable monitoring of participation of specific groups, including persons with disabilities, in the further education sector. This would be in addition to providing timely and regular data on the overall provision and outcomes.

I have tried to focus on some pieces from the report of the National Disability Authority within the time available. I hope I have given a sense of the position on further education. I have appended a brief note on the range of programmes within the further education sector for the information of the committee.

Chairman

I thank you both for the presentations. I am sure there will be many questions.

Deputy Stanton

I welcome the delegations. I congratulate both the Department and the NDA on their excellent ongoing work, which is evident from the presentations we have received, and the obvious commitment of their staff to this important area. The advancement of people with disabilities to reach full potential is to be lauded and anything the committee can do to support that work, by both the Department and the NDA, should be done. I am delighted that this presentation has been made.

I have been looking through the excellent NDA report "Towards Best Practice in the Provision of Further Education, Employment and Training Services for People with Disabilities in Ireland", which has been referred to. I have a number of questions but there may not be time to answer them. If not, people may like to reflect and come back to us.

The first recommendation calls for greater policy co-ordination between Departments. I am sure work is happening in that regard. What structures are in place to ensure this happens and has a decision yet been made? What structures have been set up to enable greater co-ordination between the Departments of Health and Children, Enterprise, Trade and Employment and Social and Family Affairs, in addition to FÁS, which is an important player?

Recommendation No. 9 refers to the National Adult Learning Council and the need for the Department to ensure the implementation of the recommendations of the White Paper on adult education and the task force on life-long learning regarding the role of the council in monitoring the participation of people with disabilities. Has further progress been made on monitoring? If not, what are the plans for so doing?

Recommendation No. 13 refers to the need to develop administrative structures for a comprehensive needs assessment which would address the further education needs of people with disabilities and direct them to the appropriate service. What is happening in regard to this important recommendation?

I would like to hear more about the network in Australia, which appears to be beneficial. The report suggests that this approach needs to be studied, but perhaps we should go beyond that and incorporate some of its methodologies. It has been suggested as a potential model for assessing and advising people with disabilities of their further education, training and employment options. Has the Department examined this possibility? Will Ms O'Connor elaborate on the potential benefits of that approach?

The report also states that the NDA should facilitate relevant Departments and agencies involved in further education in standardising data collection with a view to quantifying service provision, which is most important. What links exist between the NDA and the Department in that area?

It is suggested in recommendation No. 17 that data are lacking in placement follow-up and that FETAC would develop a database to monitor the progression of people with disabilities. Again, the same idea applies here, based on research and so forth.

Recommendation No. 18 relates to equality proofing templates across further education. That is a useful point. I would like to hear the NDA's response to this, and to the notion of disability proofing legislation in general, as to its impact on people with disabilities. As legislators, we should be aware of the possible impact of legislation. There are other ways of proofing legislation. Do we need to go that far? Does the NDA consider it a useful approach to take?

It has been suggested that monitoring and tracking procedures for all further education, training and employment service providers would become part of service contracts. That is an interesting point, which I would like to further tease out.

Recommendation No. 23 calls on all providers of further education, training and employment services to ensure their information provision takes into consideration the needs of people with disabilities and that they are provided in a range of formats. I recently attended a conference where a blind person handed out documentation in Braille and challenged everybody present to deal with it. She said this was similar to handing a blind person a printed document. It was a useful disability awareness training exercise. We were disabled in terms of reading Braille in the same way blind people cannot read print. Is that the kind of thing dealt with by this recommendation? This issue also applies to voting. As far as I am aware we do not provide ballot papers in Braille so blind people need assistance, which violates the secrecy of the ballot box. It is an interesting dilemma. A blind person made the point that she needs someone to vote for her but she could do it herself if the facilities were provided.

Recommendation No. 27 states that all providers of further education, training and employment services should ensure their premises are accessible to people with disabilities in line with the PPF commitment on the accessibility of public services. This is an important point. Is this matter being examined to ensure compliance? The point was made yesterday that the Dáil Chamber is not accessible to people in wheelchairs or on crutches.

The Department's presentation was excellent. Ms O'Connor referred to the development of national standards by the Department of Health and Children, which I accept is a separate matter, but there is an overlap. The pilot study that was carried out was dismissed. What is happening in that regard? Is the matter being further teased out? Does Ms O'Connor agree that it did not stand for anything, which was the response I got when I raised the matter in the Dáil? We await the Disability Bill, which will provide needs assessment and service provision and so on. A great deal more needs to happen in that regard.

A Department official made reference to supports required to enable people to access options regarding participation in further education or development. Have those supports been identified and what are they? Two projects were referred to, one of which is an action research pilot project in a number of further education colleges in the Dublin area. Which colleges are involved? When did the project begin and when will it be completed? It is a good project. What are the locations of the 25 projects based around the country under the adult guidance service? Another pilot project deals with information provision on the development of the adult learning database. When did that begin, how soon will it be completed and what action will flow from it? What is the location of the two special schools that are receiving further funding under the BTEI scheme, which also appears to be a commendable project?

The Department intends to develop a further education management information system to enable monitoring and participation of specific groups in the further education sector. Is funding in place for it and when will it commence?

Deputy Andrews

I welcome the delegations to the committee. As Deputy Stanton said, important work is going on in this area. I have great confidence in the Department and the National Disability Authority to co-ordinate their work. Yesterday in the Dáil there was much common ground between the different political parties and everybody seemed of one mind in terms of motives and ambitions in this area. In so many circumstances it boils down to a question of funding.

Let us consider the benefits trap, which Claire O'Connor referred to in her submission. Some disability groups have made suggestions to me on this. Ms O'Connor recommends that we increase the thresholds for the medical card to remove disincentives in the marketplace. Could we have a disability card which a person with a recognised disability could carry with him or her through life and thus always be able to avail of medical services and benefits, regardless of employment or training status? I am not sure if it would be appropriate to have a means-tested disability card. Ms O'Connor's suggestion to raise the medical card threshold is fine but it postpones the problem to a time when costs will have increased further. I am not sure if it is a long-term solution. What are the views of the National Disability Authority on this?

The aforementioned matter relates to my second point. The Employment Equality Act specifies the disabled as a group subject to discrimination. I am curious whether there has been much activity in the courts regarding indirect discrimination on the basis of people's inability to gain access to premises for the purpose of employment. Would this justify a case before the Equality Authority? Has Ms O'Connor any information on this? One of her recommendations is that Comhairle make itself available to people with a disability. Perhaps I have taken her up wrong but I would have thought Comhairle was already doing this. She stated recommendation 25 advises that Comhairle use its existing network of citizen information centres to provide information to people with disabilities on the range of further education, training and employment options available to them. I would be surprised if Comhairle was not already engaged in this. If it is so engaged, the recommendation is not appropriate.

We discussed the disability Bill in the Dáil yesterday and the day before. We do not know what its provisions will be but the delegates probably know better what is going on behind the scenes, having participated on the consultation group. We will probably be the last to know. Perhaps it is too early to discuss it in the committee. What is Ms O'Connor's view on the needs assessment aspect of the Bill? This is a crucial part of it. The committee has been dealing with the Education for Persons with Disabilities Bill for the past 12 months. What are the delegates' views on the issues under discussion in the context of that Bill, which will be enacted after the forthcoming elections?

Deputy Hoctor

I welcome the delegations from both the National Disability Authority and the Department of Education and Science. We are aware that youth workers are appointed by the Department. Will the Department officials state the brief of youth workers on disabilities? Do their job descriptions provide that they address the needs of young people with disabilities in the various urban centres in which they are appointed? How much emphasis is placed on the needs of the disabled in the appointment by the Department of Education and Science of employees, such as youth workers, to positions in various towns?

I am also interested to know the relationship between the Department and FÁS in the promotion of supported employment for those who need extra assistance when entering the workplace. Does the Department participate in the assessment and provision of FÁS services, bearing in mind that we are waiting for a particular service in north Tipperary? While the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment offers support through the funding of FÁS, does the Department of Education and Science have a role?

Some third level colleges do not make provision for those with disabilities when assessing candidates' eligibility for third level courses. Colleges should take account of people who have recently been diagnosed with a disability and others. Can the assessment process be afforded a firmer footing through the Department?

Let us admit that there is an ongoing difficulty regarding the sharing of responsibilities between the Departments of Health and Children and Education and Science. Ms O'Connor mentioned interdepartmental co-operation, which is vital if we are fully to address the needs of the disabled. We are aware that once a young person reaches the age of 18, he or she becomes the responsibility of the Department of Health and Children. What kind of relationship does the Department of Education and Science maintain with the Department of Health and Children regarding the future education of such persons? The relationship should be strengthened. The committee has inquired into whether there should be working sub-committees from both Departments to consider this issue. However, if too many people are given responsibility, nothing happens. If we do not find long-term solutions to such problems, they will come back to haunt us.

I admit I did not read Ms O'Connor's document but I look forward to doing so. My colleague has raised the issue of the benefits trap. Will Ms O'Connor elaborate on the nature of this trap?

Deputy Stanton

Will Ms O'Connor expand briefly on what the National Disability Authority means by a rights-based approach? It has been discussed widely.

Chairman

I noted a few points as we listened to the submission. I thank Ms O'Connor in particular for trying to stress the education element, which is the business of this committee. It would be injudicious for her and the members to focus on education and ignore the fact that other Departments and agencies have a central role. It is not exactly the business of the committee but, as Deputy Hoctor and others have said, it is an area regarding which there is an additional risk of people falling through the net. It seems to happen all the time.

I have not read the full submission but only some of it. Having read the contents, I started with the points I believed were most interesting. My experience, which is reflected to some extent in the submission, shows there is a very uneven level of service across the country. Traditionally, we probably say it is more uneven across health boards but it is also quite uneven across education services. Sometimes somebody takes a particular interest in this area and drives the agenda very strongly but, if not, it very much becomes a matter for the families of persons with a disability to chase and, if fortunate, receive direction. However, if they are not fortunate, it is only by accident that they may discover how to access available services, perhaps from somebody in a similar position.

There is a vote in the Dáil.

Ms Hoctor

Could we leave our guests, go to vote and then return?

Chairman

The fairest way might be to ask people to send in written responses. It is unfair to ask people to wait around for 20 minutes while we leave for a vote. Either we should take the matter up in the future or ask people for written responses to what was raised. Is that a difficulty for either the NDA or the Department?

Ms O’Connor

I would accept that.

Ms Gildea

I would probably need to go back to colleagues to get more information on some of the questions raised. I could give a written response on some issues although I could give answers on others now.

Deputy Stanton

This is such an important an interesting issue it would be a shame to rush it. Many of the questions we asked are such that it would be more useful if both delegations reflected on them for a while. Rather than make written submissions, would it be possible for them to facilitate a 9.30 slot some Thursday morning to return to the committee?

Chairman

Is that acceptable? Agreed. It would make more sense as there is a lot of teasing out to be done on some of the issues. Thank you for attending today. We will be in touch with regard to a future date. If either delegation has written answers for some of the issues, they might be useful in charting an agenda for the next occasion.

The joint committee adjourned at 1.05 p.m. sine die.