Richard O'Donoghue Demands Accountability for Disability Services
Richard O'Donoghue spoke on accountability in delivering services for people with disabilities, urging ministers to make officials accountable and replace those who fail to deliver. He told ministers he will offer assistance to G but insisted department staff must be held to performance standards.
Call for departmental accountability
He told ministers to run their departments like businesses, removing staff who fail to deliver and appointing those able to complete the work. He insisted that if officials "can't do the job, out you go" and ministers should bring in people who will deliver.
Focus on services for people with disabilities
He pressed for changes in legislation and in schools and workplaces to secure equal opportunity and consistent delivery for people with disabilities. He noted that similar promises have been made in Dáil statements 10, 15 and 5 years ago without meaningful change, attributing failure to a lack of accountability.
Concerns over government contracts and sectoral bias
He raised concerns that government contract criteria are channeling work to a single sector, limiting access and opportunity for others. He asked ministers to review procurement and criteria so that contracts advance equal opportunity for people with disabilities.
Offer of conditional support and consequences
He offered to give whatever help he can to assist G, but made clear that this support is conditional on delivery. He repeated that officials who do not deliver for vulnerable people should be removed so services can be provided.
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Ministers, best of luck in your new role. My comments today are going to be on accountability of delivering services. At the end of the day, you will be accountable. But what I'm asking you now for is to make changes within your departments that people that don't deliver within your departments for people with disabilities, that you make them accountable. So in other words, to make your department better. To make sure that if somebody doesn't do the work that we are asking for you to do and that you want to get done yourselves, there's accountability. You can't do the job, out you go and let me have somebody else in the department that can do it. When this comes to changing legislation for people to do work in schools to make it equal opportunity for people with disabilities. In the workplace, equal opportunity. We can see by government contracts that have been given out, the criteria is only going to one sector. So what I want to see from you, and I do wish you well in your position, that I want to see accountability across the board. You can't do the job, please move over and let somebody else in to deliver the services. We can go on here for every year. If you go back on the Dáil record here, through television, you can go back to anyone making a statement here. Statements have been made here 10 years ago, 15 years ago and 5 years ago, the same promises, there's been no change. But there also has been nobody in the positions that were put in, made accountable for not delivering the services. This is where I am coming from. So I want you to run your department like a business. If you can't deliver for the department, which means they can't deliver for you and the people here in Ireland, move over and let somebody in that is ambitious enough to take it on and deliver for yourselves, for everyone in this house and for everyone that needs the work done for disabilities. That's what I'm doing. So I'm going to do a different approach this time for the government. I'll give you whatever help I can do to assist G. But I want to make sure that G makes sure that the people are supposed to be delivering for you, deliver. If they don't, out please and make sure that we can deliver for the vulnerable. Thank you.
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