Taoiseach Enda Kenny has said small charities for people with disabilities who had lost funding could avail of a formal process of appeal.

“The Government, across all departments, takes the disability sector very seriously indeed,” he added. He said almost €5 billion was currently provided to disability services across the various sectors, with €1.4 billion of that provided for health and personal social services.

Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin said that two weeks ago about 26 disability and caring-focused organisations across the country had lost funding under the scheme for community and voluntary organisations.

"This has been a devastating blow for people in the health and disability area," said Mr Martin.

He said 11 organisations in the Neurological Alliance had lost their funding. He added he was talking about, overall, €1.2 million covering the cost of the 26 organisations supporting people with very rare conditions.

‘Crass stupidity’

He said Irish Times columnist Fintan O'Toole had described the Government's action as "simply crass stupidity" and it was very difficult to disagree with that.

Mr Kenny said particular residential services were provided for 9,000 people by 60 agencies in 1,200 different locations, ranging from small to large community group homes supporting independent living. Day services were provided by 80 organisations to 22,000 people living with intellectual, physical or sensory challenges or autism at 850 different locations around the country.

There were now 6,000 people with intellectual or physical disabilities availing of respite residential support and some 3.7 million hours of home support were provided by personal assistants, said Mr Kenny.

The Taoiseach said that other services provided under the disability programme included respite, early-childhood family support, community-based medical, nursing and therapy services and rehabilitative training aids and appliances.

He added that implementing the report of the value for money and policy review of the disability services programme would revolutionise how the State interacted with people with disabilities and result in a whole new model of personalised, community-based service with greater choice.

“This means the disability service will be restructured by linking budgets to activity, quality and outcomes for service users,” Mr Kenny added.

‘Personal needs’

“These are important developments in difficult circumstances and they indicate the Government’s commitment to improving quality of life for people with disabilities and to allocating resources based on personal needs.”

Mr Martin said he did not know what planet the Taoiseach inhabited. “I am talking about a figure in the region of €1 million and the figure relating to the Huntington’s Disease Association of Ireland is €22,000 per year,” he added.

“The Taoiseach should forget the appeals process and sort this out.” He said there was no heart in the decision and it was appalling.

Mr Martin said the Government’s disability strategy was in shreds. “In fact, there has not been a co-ordinated disability strategy for the past three years,” he added.