'Hypocrisy' - Waterford Councillor decries policy for families with autistic members
City Hall, Waterford City.
A Waterford councillor has decried the 'hypocrisy' of the local authority in their housing prioritisation for families with autistic members.
Waterford has formerly been declared as Ireland's first official Autism Friendly City. However, Councillor Eamon Quinlan (Fianna Fáil) has stated that the local authority is not doing enough to fully support families with neurodivergent members.
According to Cllr Quinlan, families with autistic members are given Priority 1 status when on the housing list. However, he claims that families that meet the criteria are being classified as Priority 2.
Cllr Quinlan commented that families are given prioritisation after a 'medical assessment' conducted by Council. He stated: "I have had a number of families approach me who are housing applicants where at least one member of their family has autism. Autism is on a spectrum and families have reported to me, even where things are more extreme, they keep getting rated as a priority 2 when they are medically assessed.
He raised concern over the process by which applicants are 'medically assessed': "To the best of my knowledge, the Council doesn’t employ doctors so I am very concerned about us overruling doctors and specialists who recommend a family should be rated as priority 1.
"Waterford Council advertises that those with autism can be rated priority 1 under the current criteria but I have never seen it. I have gone further about this and it has been confirmed to me in writing that in practice the Council rates pretty much all applications from persons with autism as priority 2 across the board. To me this is too general and is unsound.”
He added: "It is my strong hope that our housing committee within the Council will relook at this and make the right changes. If we were dealing with families with more money to hand, I feel the Council would have been challenged long along on this practice, civilly, and hopefully, had this quiet policy, overturned."
Waterford City and County Council have been reached for comment.
