"IF this service was pulled in the morning, my life would crumble around me. Without it I would undoubtedly be in residential care."

This is what having a personal assistant means to people with disabilities who are receiving the service. For Ms Aileen Daly, having personal assistants meant she could go to university and get a degree in social science. She is now living in her own apartment and working full-time.

Pioneered by the Centre for Independent Living, the personal assistance service involves the employment of personal assistants by people with physical disabilities to enable them to live as independent a life as possible.

The personal assistant provides assistance at the discretion and direction of the person with the disability.

This may involve help with the tasks of everyday living such as personal care and household tasks. It may also entail assistance outside the home, whether in a work or social situation.

The philosophy of independent living that underpins the personal assistant service is about promoting choice and independence for the person with the disability, known as the leader.

Service providers agree that a significant proportion of people with disabilities would be interested in availing of personal assistance services.

It is accepted that having such a service allows people to integrate more into their local community and greatly improves their quality of life, resulting in significant social gain to people with disabilities and their carers.

So how do you go about applying for personal assistant services and how difficult is it to secure them? There are three main organisations that deal with the provision of personal assistant services.

The Centre for Independent Living has 26 centres around the State; the Irish Wheelchair Association is based in Clontarf in Dublin; and Independent Living and Services is based in Sandymount, also in Dublin.

These organisations can provide applicants with a list of personal assistants and they also provide training and assessment.

Since 1994, the Department of Health has allocated funding to the personal assistant scheme run by the Irish Wheelchair Association. More than 60 people between the ages of 18 and 65 avail of Eastern Regional Health Authority personal assistant services.

The personal assistant service provided by the Centre for Independent Living is funded through community employment schemes. People taking part in these schemes can work up to a maximum of 191/2 hours per week.

If you want to access personal assistant services through the Centre for Independent Living, you are limited by the structure of the Community Employment scheme. You must live in the catchment area and accept the limit on available hours.

Community employment schemes have been scaled down in the recent past and, according to Ms Selina Bonnie of the Centre for Independent Living, it is becoming increasingly difficult to get people to take up places.

Students with a disability who need a personal assistant for the hours they are in college can apply to the Special Fund for Students with Disabilities.

The Department of Education, with assistance from the European Social Fund, operates a scheme for the provision of services and the purchase of equipment for third-level students with disabilities. The scheme is open to students with serious sensory, physical and/or communicative disabilities.

The Association for Higher Education Access & Disability publishes guidelines for students looking for personal assistants.

In order to apply for funding under the Special Fund, students must be registered with a university, institute of technology or post-leaving certificate centre.

The student works with the disability officer in the university, access officer in the institute of technology or the principal in the case of a post-leaving certificate centre, in making an application to the Special Fund.

Applications must be made by October of the year of entry to a third-level institution and the funding does not generally come through until Christmas of that year.

Students outside the Eastern Regional Health Authority area who need a personal assistant outside college hours and non-students outside the Eastern Regional Health Authority area have to secure funding from their local health board.

Applicants for personal assistant services have to estimate how many hours per week and what nature of assistance they need. An occupational therapist or co-ordinator from one of the agencies involved helps with this assessment. The funding is not means tested.

Demand always outstrips supply for these services and priority is generally given to those who need a personal assistant to undertake third-level education, training, employment or as an alternative to residential care. Once the funding comes through, the applicant has to find a personal assistant.

The Irish Wheelchair Association and the other organisations involved have lists of people who are interested in personal assistant work. The disabled person may already have identified the person they wish to employ or they may want to advertise for potential candidates.

The leader has to return a fortnightly timesheet to the service provider so that the personal assistant gets paid.

There is a scale of increments linked to experience but the basic rate of pay for personal assistants is £7.28 per hour. It sometimes happens that someone will be approved for funding but is unable to get a personal assistant because of the shortage of available workers. Some leaders share personal assistants. The relationship between a leader and his or her personal assistant can be quite intense. Ms Bonnie of the Centre for Independent Living believes it's important to keep the relationship on a professional basis. "It can be too claustrophobic if you are friends and you need some professional boundaries in place.

"At the end of the day, the leader is the person in control and you have to be able to give directions freely."

Mr John Dolan of the Disability Federation of Ireland says it's easy to underestimate what's involved in managing personal assistants in your life. "It demands commitment, skill and compromise."