Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 20 February 2024
477. Deputy Pauline Tully asked the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the number of residential places for disabled people that were delivered in 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 and to date in 2024. [7503/24]
View answerI wish to thank the Deputy for raising this question.
The Deputy will likely be aware that the industrial action by certain Fórsa grades in the HSE that commenced on Friday 6th October 2023 has been suspended.
The HSE has indicated that they have recommenced operations as normal, but there is a significant backlog in the gathering of demographic information such as the data requested. My Department is providing data from September 2023, the latest available data on the number of residential places provided for people with a disability.
Residential services make up the largest part of the Disability funding disbursed by the HSE - 58% of the total budget. Approximately 90 service providers provide residential services to over 8,300 individuals throughout the country.
These places were delivered predominantly by section 38 and section 39 organisations funded under the Health Act 2004.
It is important to note that residential capacity in the system can be reduced. When residents of congregated settings sadly pass away, their places are not ordinarily re-utilised. This is in keeping with Government policy which is to move away from institutionalised settings (i.e. Time to Move On from Congregate Settings).
The information requested by the Deputy is tabled below.
|
Year |
December 2020 |
December 2021 |
December 2022 |
September 2023* |
|
No. of Places Delivered |
8,139 |
8,146 |
8,283 |
8,355 |
* The total number of places provided to December 2023 to be confirmed by the HSE
