Following the launch of new HSE Roadmap for Service Improvement 2023 – 2026, Disability Services for Children and Young People on Thursday 24th October by Ministers Roderic O’Gorman and Anne Rabbitte, Fórsa issued a non-cooperation instruction to members  working in the provision of Disability Services. 

The union issued the instruction due to serious concern about the lack of consultation with members, service users, parents, families, and relevant professional bodies, and stated that while the development of the roadmap is welcome, the resources available for its implementation are inadequate, not least due to the ongoing and significant recruitment and retention challenges within children's disability network teams (CDNTs).

This week, in advance of the parties reconvening under the auspices of the WRC, Fórsa national secretary Linda Kelly issued a comprehensive letter to Bernard O’Regan, HSE Head of Operations – Disabilities Community Operations, outlining the “significant and interconnected” issues in dispute. These include: 

• The purposeful exclusion of members, who are frontline staff, from the development of the Roadmap.
• Plans to use private service providers for the provision of public services. Fórsa will not accept any attempt to privatise disability services.
• The absence of a recommendation for an evidence-based workforce plan. It will be impossible to deliver the Roadmap without an appropriately staffed service.
• Uncertainty around clinical governance which is a key driver in staff leaving the service.
• The central focus on AON throughout the roadmap reinforces the current system, which is driving families to AON to access services, though that is not a requirement.
• The introduction of a large number of therapy assistants. 

Ms Kelly said: “It is disappointing that we have been forced to place ourselves in dispute due to the myopic approach of management on the development of the Roadmap. What could have been the beginning of a positive new chapter for the service is now, once again, an issue fraught with stress and tension of staff and for families accessing the service.”

The Health and Welfare Divisional Executive Committee will meet on the 29th November and will discuss and agree an appropriate course of action as the next steps in this dispute.