New group vows to fight disability cuts

AS a response to the ongoing cuts to the lives of people with disabilities, a number of people have organised themselves under the internationally recognised name of the (Clare) Centre for Independent Living.

On May 24 at a public meeting, the Disabled People Against Cuts group agreed to get organised. “It was recognised disabled people need the support of each other to ensure that all the years of campaigning, developing and understanding of independent living and trying to have a rightful place in society was not lost as a result of the recession and other practices. There are a lot of people with disabilities who have achieved an enormous amount who want to maintain their quality of life, continue to contribute to society and support and encourage other disabled people to do so,” Ann Marie Flanagan said.

In 1992 when Ms Flanagan, Dermot Hayes and others were campaigning for the development of independent living, they were starting from a point of “what could be”, with an unyielding belief in the philosophy of independent living.

“In Clare, disabled people do not have a formal voice locally in how the HSE and the local authority spends funding directly relating to their services, separate to the organisations who are in receipt of the funding. We need to be able to ask the HSE how the budget is being spent and say how we feel it can be improved. We are the service users, who will do everything to maximise the funding, to have the best outcomes for our lives. We can’t do that currently,” Ms Flanagan explained.

CCIL wants to develop best practice in service-user involvement, evaluation and service development. As with the international movement, CCIL has two primary ­objectives; to promote independent living, equality and inclusion for people with disabilities and to promote the freedom of choice and self-determination of people with disabilities.

“We will build on our body of knowledge and expertise. We will support each other with empathy as a central practise.

“We will celebrate our difference and use this to generate an understanding that an inclusive society must make space for our difference, embrace it and respond to it.

“We want to build on good State policy to help deepen the understanding of public servants and elected representatives that independent living is critical when deciding on funding, policy and legislation,” Ms Flanagan added.