Yes I was P.Shaw (if that is your name or are you one of many who do not have the guts to use your real name) and I am very pleased to learn that 10 residences will be built over the next 3 years. So you and Ms Caruana Galizia will slowly but surely start to eat your words. As I do not read this blog, I am grateful to one of my friends ( I still have a few) for letting me know that I had featured. Hence my comment 10 days after the fact.

[Daphne – If you think the 10 residential homes which have yet, like the power station, to materialise are well worth the price the entire country is now having to pay, then so be it. You will, I assume, forgive those who have made an entirely different cost-benefit analysis, and this includes individuals who are concerned about disabled family members too, and do not think it a brilliant move to set fire to the economy, bring in the extremes of cronyism and corruption, and erode Malta’s credibility just so that their children have somewhere to live when they die.

I will most definitely not eat my words. On the contrary, every passing day of this government proves me right and you, a generation my senior and presumably more experienced in life, hopelessly wrong in political judgement and, more crucially, assessment of personalities. I do not want government ministers’ drivers shooting at people in the street just so Tony Zammit Cutajar’s son has somewhere to live. That’s your responsibility as a parent, not the rest of the country’s.]

Wasn’t Tony Zammit Cutajar also campaigning for a residential home for the disabled in every village?

If the parents were to pull their children out of private schools and send them to a state school, the LSAs will still need to be provided and the government will have the added cost of the individual pupil too.

But when one is short sighted the full implications are never seen.

I can’t believe how ignorant the people who post comments in favour of this ‘moviment gdid’ are. The comments on timesofmalta.com are enough to make you cringe.

How this country is going to take ten years of this is beyond my imagination.

Please God, deliver us from this evil.

People who have a disability are being side-lined for the likes of Mangion, Alamango, Gambin, Sai Laing, their band of merry men, women, transgender lot.

We have come to a point where being a gay man or transgender gets more attention and funding than being disabled.

Disabled people, due to their nature, cannot have a party on St George’s Square or carcade to appease the stupid media-seeking government, if they pass legislation to give them a stronger voice.

Incidentally, were are the NGOs and KNPD statements voicing their disgust on this? Kulhadd diletant f’ dal-pajjiz.

[Daphne – Oh, I don’t think it’s at all about the party or the carcade. It’s a matter of image and branding. Joseph Muscat does not want to brand himself by association with ‘unsexy’ disabled people. He wants to brand himself with what he believes are ‘sexy’ gay men. That’s about the sum of it.]

I can tell you how San Anton will solve the problem – they will just charge the parents higher fees for their children’s tuition. That is the standard way they deal with costs.

I wonder if the prime children’s fees are the same as the rest, and I would bet my hat that if they are charged, they are paid by the state.

I’m sure a dyslexic child would be delighted to be called disabled. The term is most usually used to refer to a physical disability, not a slight learning difficulty.

[Daphne – You are completely wrong, and your upset is indicative of what is perhaps a personal prejudice against the physically handicapped. Disabled people are by definition all those whose abilities are less than the functional standard, however that happens or whatever form it takes. When my right arm was in plaster for two months I was temporarily disabled, as a result of which I couldn’t perform certain standard tasks like driving or writing. I had absolutely no problem saying so. People who are not disabled do not require extraordinary dedicated assistance.]