Thousands of autistic children are being denied the opportunity to realise their potential because of a failure by the Health Service Executive to provide early assessments and relevant speech and language services. The law requires that children with special needs are assessed within six months of application and follow-up services provided. But waiting lists have been growing. There is a shortage of therapists. And the HSE justifies the situation on the basis of inadequate funding.

At a time when Government Ministers are talking about “giving back” to society, this is one area where equity and traditional patterns of exclusion should be addressed. Nationally, nearly 2,000 children have been awaiting assessment for more than a year while a further 3,000 are being denied the services for which they qualify. That dreadful situation fits into a pattern whereby the most vulnerable and marginalised are pushed to the back of the spending queue.

Because of political considerations and professional muscle, spending on acute hospital care has trumped other considerations when resources are allocated by the HSE. This has been reflected by the treatment of elderly people requiring nursing home care; in inadequate mental health services and a gross shortage of speech and language therapists.

Few people would deny that the manner in which hospitals operate is inefficient and wasteful. But reform has been desperately slow while demands for additional funding grow shriller. It would be a travesty if services for the most vulnerable were affected by this situation. Inclusion Ireland, a group representing children with disabilities, has suggested the forthcoming budget should provide for a multi-annual investment programme that would provide equality of services across the State and double the number of speech and language therapists. A process of "giving back" to the community should be inclusive of all citizens.