The Government will not row back on a controversial measure in the Disability Bill which would restrict access to the courts for people seeking the provision of adequate services.
Ministers discussed a number of changes to the Disability Bill which are due to be announced today, but they have ruled out compromising on the provision in the legislation relating to access to the courts.
The last Disability Bill was withdrawn in the months leading up to the 2002 general election due to widespread protest, primarily over a similar section which would have removed the right of access to the court for disabled people seeking appropriate services.
The Irish Times has learned that a number of amendments have been made to the Bill aimed at winning wider support for the legislation. They include:
A provision allowing for the Ombudsman to be used as an appeals officer in cases where there is a dispute over services being provided;
A wider definition of disability, which lobby groups have argued will exclude many categories of people with disabilities;
A simpler complaints and appeals process;
A reworded provision making the right to a needs assessment clearer.
The Minister of State at the Department of Justice Frank Fahey is today due to meet with the Disability Rights Consultation Group, an umbrella group of organisations working in the disability sector, where the amendments will be discussed.
While the changes are likely to be welcomed, groups representing disabled people are expected to be angered by the general exclusion of court proceedings. The State is facing more than 100 High Court cases regarding its alleged failure to provide adequate therapeutic or education services for people with special needs. It has settled 130 such cases since 1996.
Government sources, however, say it will not have any impact on cases which deal with education, and argue there is no right to health services, which are the main focus of the Bill.
Embrace, a support group for people with disabilities, said yesterday it had obtained legal advice which concluded that restricting access to the court was unconstitutional and likely to breach the European Convention on Human Rights.
In a statement, the group said the Government's move was an attempt to remove the right of access to the courts and replace it with a series of "bureaucratic hoops" without any guarantee of receiving appropriate services.
"At the end of this bureaucratic process, there is no realistic enforcement mechanism in place in the event of there being failure to deliver assessment or assessed needs in an appropriate fashion and within a limited time scale.
"The courts have been the only arm of the State to vindicate the rights of people with disabilities who have been shamefully and deliberately neglected by a State which has manifestly failed them."
The legislation is likely to be enacted before the summer.