Disabled people should be given direct payments from the Government to fund personal assistant schemes and pay for other services, a Clare voluntary group says.
Disabled People of Clare, representing people with physical and sensory disabilities, made a pre-Budget submission arguing the case, based on a philosophy that emerged on the University of Berkeley campus in California in the early 1970s. It promotes independence for the disabled.
Mr Dermot Hayes, programme manager for the group, said there were 30 members in Clare pressing to be either put on a personal assistant (PA) scheme or have the service expanded. A PA is normally a person who works part-time, helping the disabled in their daily activities.
Mr Hayes's submission follows a submission from the National Disability Authority to the Government that disabled people, rather than service-providers, should have control over how they are treated.
He said that because the health boards administered the funding, disabled people were not getting the amounts set out by the Government. "Really, the health board should be cut out of the equation. This is about direct payments and it is about independent living and it is about saving the taxpayer money," he said.
Mr Ger Crowley, assistant chief executive with the Mid-Western Health Board, said the board had commissioned an evaluation of a pilot PA scheme run by the board.
"We would be surprised if it does not say that personal assistance is only one part of the range of support services that are actually needed."