Published date: 17 Jan 2025

Child Protection needs to be the top priority for the incoming Government and new Minister for Children

The Children’s Rights Alliance is calling for child protection to be an absolute priority in the lifetime of this new Government in light of two new inspection reports published today (17.01.2024), by Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA).

Responding to the inspection reports, Chief Executive of the Children’s Rights Alliance, Tanya Ward stated: “The latest inspection reports by HIQA now sit on top of a growing body of evidence that our core child protection and welfare services need to be an absolute priority for the incoming Government and new Minister for Children.

What is clear from these reports is that when faced with rapid increases in demand for services, and the growing complexity of cases within that, Tusla – the Child and Family Agency have had no choice but to prioritise interventions for the children at most immediate risk or with the highest needs. However, this comes at a cost with children and young people who do not meet the emergency or immediate threshold being left behind. Even in this triaged approach, children with lower levels of need are being failed. Political representatives can no longer ignore the fact that the State services with duty to care for most vulnerable children do not have the capacity to ensure all will be protected from harm.”

The HIQA reports published are on an overview report on the governance of child protection and welfare and foster care services, which focused on 10 areas and specific report on the National Out of Hours Services which provides an emergency service outside of Tusla’s office hours.

Overview Report on the Governance of the Child and Family Agency (Tusla) Child Protection and Welfare and Foster Care Services

The Report is a tale of two halves. On one hand, the majority of children and parents receiving social work interventions spoke positively of their experiences. However, due to the rising numbers of referrals, Tusla is operating a triage system. This has been successful in identifying children experiencing chronic neglect and abuse. However, it has also meant that children with lower levels of need had to wait for an assessment. This resulted in risk to some children accumulating over time. What was deemed safe on day 1 became seriously unsafe by day 43.”

The other concern related to thresholds at Tusla as well and whether they were set too high which is all hallmarks of a service under severe pressure. Our members that work in child protection have consistently raised this as an issue with us.”

HIQA point to the single biggest reason why the service is failing to assess all children in an adequate timeframe down to rising numbers of referrals and not enough social workers. Social workers play a critical role in the delivery of care for the most vulnerable children. But there is not nearly enough workers on the ground to meet the current demand. HIQA also point to serious gaps in the referral pathways and risk management including the inexcusable failure of staff to escalate the concerns of other agencies or children themselves to the appropriate person or team.”

Key concerns included:
Unallocated Lists: Children prioritised as at medium and low risk did not always receive the right support at the right time. The level of risk or safety was not always established by Tusla before children were placed on waiting lists for long periods of time.
Referral Pathways: In some cases, referrals were made by schools and other professionals due to concerns. HIQA was concerned that children who had been assessed as requiring an ongoing social work service were not transferred to the most appropriate team to ensure their needs were met in a timely manner.
Children at risk: Inspectors found cases where children who made allegations of abuse or where there were concerns in relation to their welfare, weeks and months prior to the inspection had not been met with or an adequate safety plan put in place by the time of the inspections.
Special Emergency Arrangements: Inspectors were concerned about the lack of provision for especially vulnerable children who remained at high risk of harm and continued to reside in unregulated settings, particularly in the Cork service area.

The National Out of Hours Report
At the heart of any service for children and young people, child protection and safety must come first so it is of serious concern to see the Out of Hours Service failing to uphold either. While HIQA found that children most at risk received at appropriate response, it found overall major governance, management and oversight failings in the service. This resulted in very serious issues for children. For example, children were placed in special emergency arrangements that were not adequately risk assessed. In some cases, referrals were not made to the Gardaí of cases of child exploitation. In one case the child then went missing from care. Only a handful of children had a social worker and those placed in placements were not being adequately monitored.”

Key concerns included:
Safeguarding: The Out of Hours Service were working outside the confines of the national Standard Operating Procedure. This is a particular concern given that the service was using hotels in Dublin for emergency arrangements, which had not been risk assessed, to ensure that they provided a safe place for children. For emergency family care arrangements, there were cases where there was no evidence of social workers having ensured that safeguarding checks were undertaken to confirm the identity of the adults caring for the child.
Children missing in care: It was also found that there was inconsistency in practice from the Out of Hours Service in the management of children who went missing in care.

This week, the Government published its Draft Programme for Government committing to develop a national plan on alternative care.

This HIQA report comes at a crucial time. The Government is planning a new alternative care strategy. It is critical that this is a major priority for the incoming government. It needs to take account of our child protection and welfare system and address the lack of foster carers and social workers. This needs to be followed by funding directly earmarked for child protection, welfare and family support.”

Children and young people need a voice at the Cabinet table and child protection and welfare need to be on the top of the list for our next Minister with responsibility for children.”

_ENDS_

 

Contact: Robyn Keleghan: [email protected] 0858001275

Notes to Editors:

  • Tanya Ward, Children’s Rights Alliance is available for media interviews.
  • The reports are on an overview report on the governance of child protection and welfare and foster care services, which focused on areas where 25% or more children were without an allocated social worker, and an inspection report on the National Out of Hours Service, which provides an emergency child protection and welfare response outside of Tusla’s office hours.
  • Read HIQA’s National Out of Hours Service Report here
  • Read HIQA’s overview report here

 

About the Children’s Rights Alliance
Founded in 1995, the Children’s Rights Alliance unites over 160 members working together to make Ireland one of the best places in the world to be a child. Further information is available at: childrensrights.ie or on Twitter, @ChildRightsIRL

For media queries, please contact:

Emma Archbold

Campaigns and Communications Director