Charity stresses issues for disabled ahead of Budget

A CHARITY is working to highlight the issues facing people with an intellectual disability and their families, having held a town hall event ahead of Budget 2024.

Next Tuesday, October 10, Government spending for the year ahead will be announced by Minister for Public Expenditure, Paschal Donohoe TD.

WALK, which is also known as Walkinstown Association for People with an Intellectual Disability Limited, provides services to more than 250 people with an intellectual disability and their families.

Ahead of the Minister’s announcement, WALK organised a town hall event in Rua Red, inviting politicians and stakeholders to highlight the National Federation of Voluntary Bodies Budget 2024 Campaign.

Getting the message across, WALK and the National Federation created a document title Key Budget 2024 Priorities.

One of the key concerns WALK has been the disparity between section 38 agencies, which operate within the HSE Employment Control Framework, and section 39 agencies, which are community-based and operate through service level agreements with the HSE and Department.

Ultimately, this creates recruitment challenges and puts the sustainability of WALK “at risk” because of a lack of pay parity, it claims.

Inflation and rising operation costs in tandem with underfunding of WALK services is “putting us under considerable pressure and challenging our ability to deliver effective services”.

WALK says that despite the need for residential spaces and waiting lists, the vacancies in its residential services are not being filled “due to a lack of appropriate funding being offered”.

The charity is also seeking funding to better meet the needs of the older people it supports and improve its respite capacity.

According to WALK, more than 70 per cent of disability services in Ireland are provided by the not-for-profit sector.

The National Federation of Voluntary Service Providers is an umbrella body which represents not-for-profit service providers supporting people with intellectual disabilities and autism across Ireland.

Working with the National Federation, which supports some 26,000 people with intellectual disabilities and their families across Ireland, WALK is at the forefront locally.

The majority of WALK service locations are in the Dublin South West and Dublin South Central constituencies and it provides employment for over 220 people.

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