Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness has met families affected by the multi-million pound underspend on disability services in the Western Health Trust and pledged his support for an investigation into the controversy and the funds to be released.
The Foyle MLA was speaking after a Sinn Féin delegation, which Foyle MLA Raymond McCartney and Maeve McLaughlin (pictured), met with Western Adult Learning Disability Action Group (WALDAG) in Derry .
Mr McGuinness said: "I want to pay tribute to the families and to offer them my support," he commented.
"Many of them have been struggling for decades without the support they are entitled to so I fully understand their anger when it emerged that local learning disability services are being underfunded by up to £8million a year while physical disability services are losing as much as £4million.
“These funds have been earmarked for vulnerable people and if they are not being properly utilised, that is an intolerable situation.
"I have already confirmed that one of my first actions in the new Executive will be to ensure the incoming Health Minister intervenes in this case with a view to investigating how this situation came about and to rectify it immediately so that these resources provide the valuable services for which they were intended."
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