An tOrd Gnó - Order of Business Seanad Éireann — 2026-09-24 ============================================================ Tom Clonan (IND), University of Dublin I welcome my intern, Sophia Mulvany, the inestimable Sophia. She will be with me until Christmas. I am delighted to welcome her to the Chamber. It is my first time to speak on the Order of Business since we resumed the Houses and I want to express my sincere sympathies and condolences to Senator Craughwell. Gerard is a big man with a big heart and, at the end of the day, all we have are our relationships with each other. Having lost his wife after 49 years of marriage it is very hard to see Gerard heartbroken and I wish him very well in the journey forward. We express our solidarity with him. I want to raise a question on the Order of Business today regarding the debate on citizenship and the new rules. The speaking time has been reduced to 120 seconds for Members and I ask the Deputy Leader whether we can have an extension to this debate today. I want to raise a couple of issues this morning. Exactly 15 months ago, on 25 June 2025, I introduced my Disability (Personalised Budgets) Bill in the House. It was time delayed by the Minister, Deputy Foley, for 18 months without any consideration of the Bill. I got pro bono advice from one of the large legal firms. It was the first time in the history of the State that an international firm worked with the Office of Parliamentary Legal Advisers. We took every piece of Government policy and consultation the Government had and drafted this legislation. I had a legal team from that legal firm for two years and the Minister just guillotined it with a delay of 18 months until Christmas Day 2026. I believe it is listed to be re-read on Christmas Day this year. This is a cynical abuse of the House. The Minister, Deputy Foley, said on the day that "Collaboration and co-operation will be the hallmark of how this Government approaches the disability sector". She called it a "sector". It is not a cost centre; these are people like my son. She then said, "Therefore, I look forward to working with everyone, including the Members of this House, to achieve tangible change for people with disabilities." She referred to "people with disabilities" but I think she means disabled citizens. In the 15 months since then, I have written repeatedly to the Minister, Deputy Foley, and the Minister of State, Deputy Higgins. This week, I received an email from the Minister’s PA, which outlined that the Minister was not in a position to meet me. The Minister is not going to meet me on this and disabled citizens all over this country are going to be left disempowered in this way, including members of staff in this House, who are well-known to all Senators and are struggling. I know one member of staff whose wife has to go with their disabled adult son every day to a resource centre in Tallaght. That is inhumane and wrong. The Disability (Personalised Budgets) Bill would solve those problems. In the absence of willingness on the part of the Minister or Minister of State to meet me, I ask for a debate in this House on disability personalised budgets. I apologise to the Leas-Chathaoirleach for going over time, given the matters I had to raise earlier. The Disability (Amendment) Bill listed in the programme for Government is a catastrophic move. For the past four years, I have been saying that the only legal right disabled citizens in Ireland have is the right to an assessment of need. The Disability (Amendment) Bill that is being proposed will dilute and remove that right. We will have no rights. I am asking my colleagues to please not do this. This is like the referendum on care and the Green Paper on disability reform. It is a catastrophic step for disabled citizens dressed up as progress. It is not progress; it is a catastrophic step backwards. --- 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/seanad/2026-09-24/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-09-28T05:50:50+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-09-24