Apology issued after group of disabled people 'trapped' in lift during Dail trip

Irish Daily Mirror

8 hours ago

A group of people with disabilities who were invited to Leinster House to deliver training on accessibility ended up 'trapped' and 'embarrassed' after a lift broke down in the parliamentary complex.
The organisation, which provides disability awareness training, said they were 'astonished' at how inaccessible Leinster House was after their disastrous visit to Dublin last year.
In an email, they described supposedly accessible toilets that weren't large enough to cater for wheelchairs, buses being refused access to drop off people with mobility issues, and a broken-down lift that left five members 'stranded'.
They told the head of the Oireachtas that members were stuck on a corridor and 'very embarrassed' as able-bodied people had to 'edge' their way past them on their way to offices or lunch.
A message said: 'From the moment of our arrival, we encountered barriers and exclusion.' The visit was made by members of the HSE Gold Star Disability Awareness Training programme and volunteers from Tipperary last June on the invitation of an Oireachtas member.
In the email, they said the room where they delivered their training session was inaccessible on 'a number of disability access levels'.
Then, when members were trying to go downstairs to the restaurant, one lift broke down and another was discovered to be out of service.
The email said: 'The lift to offer access to the lower corridor en route to the restaurant broke down when we had five people safely down, leaving others stranded at the top.
'Once these five people tried to continue to access the restaurant, they were met with a note on the second lift that said, 'Temporarily Out of Order'.'
The message continued: 'Every person there was tired, embarrassed, disappointed, hungry and let down once more in terms of their rights to universal access and the dignity of using a toilet privately.'
It said these were just some of the issues that needed to be addressed and asked for a meeting with Oireachtas management.
In response, the Clerk of the Dail Peter Finnegan expressed his 'sincere apologies' for how the visit had unfolded.
He added: 'We fell well short of the standards that people are entitled to expect when they visit their National Parliament.'
A representative of the group returned in July to give advice on how Leinster House could be made more accessible for people with disabilities.
However, progress has been slow, in particular around the replacement and upgrading of lifts.
In September, the representative of the group wrote again for an update.
Mr Finnegan replied: 'The advice provided by the OPW is that the project to install a new platform lift for the Member's restaurant will be more complex than just simply replacing the existing lift.