"We don't want people to feel sorry for us and we don't charity - we want our human rights," Marian Maloney told a packed room of people with disabilities.
Ms Maloney was speaking at the launch of the Disable Inequality campaign at Trinity College Dublin on Wednesday.
The election campaign is calling for a full-time cabinet minister for disability inclusion, a fair income for people with disabilities and the reinstatement €150 million to disability health services cut since 2008.
Ms Maloney said a designated minister was vital to address the needs of people with disability.
“The barriers and attitudes out there, and the assumptions people make about us, is really getting to me as I get older. People say things like, ‘Oh but you don’t look blind’,” she said.
‘A normal woman’
“I stand before you today as a normal woman. My eyes don’t work right but I have stopped apologising for that.
“We want our rights. We are citizens of this country, we have a vote to cast.”
The latest figures from the Disability Federation of Ireland, which supports the campaign, show 600,000 people are living with a disability in Ireland, which is 13 per cent of the population, and two in three people know or care for someone with a disability.
Katie Bourke, who is from Sligo and was one of the many that experienced difficulties travelling across the country to attend the meeting, said her county did not have a bus she could use to get to Dublin.
“We’ve got less than 5 per cent of accessible services,” she said.
“I’m disabled and also a parent. I currently can’t bring my child on the bus because there’s only space for a wheelchair or a buggy.
“I’m entirely sick of us being thought of as a different class of people with different needs.”
John Dolan, campaign director, said this was the first campaign that gave people with disability one voice.
‘Deeply unequal country’
“Ireland is a deeply unequal country for people with disabilities. It is a country where discrimination, segregation and bias is a daily experience,” he said.
“Over 3,000 are still locked up in outdated institutions. Does that seem fair to you?”
The campaign also calls for an increase in the disability allowance of €20 and the introduction of a disability tax credit.
“People with disabilities are among the poorest and most marginalised groups in the country. Over 70 per cent are unemployed. Only one in two go beyond secondary education,” Mr Dolan said.
He said children with disabilities often could not attend their local schools because of a lack of basic supports.
“We have never had a serious political commitment to ending the unfairness that is a systemic part of life for thousands of people and their families. In this year of election and reflection, we must disable inequality for once.”
