Disability Services
Dail Éireann — 2026-04-23
============================================================

Emer Higgins (FG), Dublin Mid-West

I would too. I have met members of the Before We Die campaign twice, as has the Minister, Deputy Foley, and, I believe, many other members of the Government. I first met them at their request and the second time was at my request because I wanted to have a follow-up meeting with senior officials from the HSE to sit down together and work out a plan of action. I also acknowledge parents whose adult children attend the day services at Remember Us in Balbriggan, who I met on this issue as well. I met a young advocate yesterday on this and I will meet with two parents who are in a similar situation this afternoon.
I am very glad we have moved to a situation where we are funding planned placements, rather than constantly responding to emerging crises. It is important we can provide that certainty for both the adults and the parents. This year, for the first time, we are moving towards a strategy of planned placements. The numbers are small but we expect to be able to fill them. We will be in a good position to then ask for the Department of public expenditure and reform to fill more.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-04-23/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:54:48+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-04-23