Joint Oireachtas Committee On

Joint Oireachtas Committee on

Health and Children

Thursday 13th November 2014

Questions 1-31

Question 1 (Senator Imelda Henry)

To ask the Minister for a progress report on the commitment thatchildren would no longer be sent to adult prisons.

There is a commitment in the Programme for Government to end the practice of detaining children in adult prison facilities, which under the Children Act 2001 means all young people up to the age of 18 years. This will be met when the extension of the Oberstown campus results in the transfer of responsibility for 17 year old boys from the adult prison system to the children detention schools.

Following the appointment of a main contractor and a number of sub-contractors, construction on the Oberstown development project started on site on 23 September 2013. The project will enable the extension of the child care model of detention to all under 18 year olds ordered to be remanded or committed by the courts on criminal justice charges and meet the commitment in the Programme for Government to end the use of adult prison facilities for children. A further 3 residential units, to be delivered in 2015, will replace existing detention buildings used by Oberstown Boys School which have reached the end of their useful life. The project, which will also deliver new education , recreation, visiting, medical and other ancillary facilities, is due to be fully complete in 2015.

Construction on site is progressing well. The first 3 units of residential accommodation will prioritise the transfer of responsibility for 17 year old boys from the adult prison system. I understand that the Office of Public Works, which is managing this project on behalf of my Department, will complete the required inspection and approval of the first 3 units from the main contractor within the next week. This will allow for the formal handover of these buildings to the Oberstown campus. At this stage, I am advised that there will be a need for a further period of 6 weeks for the fitting out of the new buildings with required furniture and equipment and also staff training and orientation in the new units. This is necessary to ensure safe and secure custody of children in the new buildings and that appropriate health and safety standards are met.

The recruitment programme for new care staff required to work in the expanded Oberstown campus is also making good progress. To date, a total of 24 new care staff have commenced employment on the campus and my Department is projecting that a total of 39 staff will have commenced employment by end 2014. An additional recruitment process for a further phase of recruitment is currently being advanced and it is intended that the required staff complement will be reached in the first quarter of 2015 for the operation of all of the new units.

My Department is also progressing the necessary legal changes required in order to transfer responsibility for 17 year old boys from the adult prison system to the Oberstown campus. Heads of a Bill to amend the Children Act 2001 were approved by Government in September. My Department has been working intensively with the Office for Parliamentary Counsel, and assuming that no difficulties arise in the drafting, I hope to publish the Bill next month

The Bill is required in particular to provide clarity on the legal position of children reaching the age of 18 years in the children detention school system and to delete all references on the Irish statute book to the possibility of detaining children in adult prison facilities. I intend that the Bill will be enacted as early as possible in 2015.

Question 2 (Deputy Clare Daly)

To ask the Minister for Children & Youth Affairs to ensure that the Terms of Reference of the Mother and Baby Home Inquiry are structured in a manner that is comprehensive and inclusive, to deal with how society treated women who were pregnant outside marriage & their children, including all institutions either state supported or religious run, covering all religious denominations, hostels, county homes and adoption practises.

Question 22 (Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin)

That the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs will advise the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children of progress with the work of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes and other similar institutions and if he will advise on the timeframe for the Commission to complete its investigations and report on its findings and if he will make a statement on the matter.

I propose to take questions 2 & 22 together.

The Government has undertaken to establish a statutory Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes. The scope of this investigation will go beyond the home operated by the Sisters of Bon Secours in Tuam, Co. Galway so as to establish a comprehensive account in respect of these matters of public importance. Moreover, the Commission will be established in a manner which enables its investigation to deliver an account on these sensitive issues in a reasonable time period for the mothers and children who were in these institutions.

Considerable progress has been achieved to date in this important task, including the publication of the Inter-Departmental Group’s Report and the announcement that Judge Yvonne Murphy will Chair this independent investigation.

Following discussions with colleagues across Government the work of developing the Terms of Reference is now well advanced. Consultations are progressing with the Attorney General and her officials with a view to finalising our deliberations in early course. In parallel with this legislative work, my Department is also advancing arrangements for the provision of staff and related operational supports to facilitate the effective working of the Commission.

Given the breadth and scale of the issues involved, and our experience of previous statutory inquiries, it is essential that the Commission is provided with comprehensive and precise terms of reference from the outset. The tasks to be undertaken, and the appropriate range of methodologies to be utilised, must be defined to ensure the Commission is set up on a sound footing. In addition, the terms of reference will specify the timeframe for the Commission to complete its investigation and produce a final Report.

As I have said before, it is important to take the necessary time for drafting and consultation on these complex matters to ensure the Commission can deliver on public expectations in a realistic manner. Given the level of cross-party and public interest in these matters I am anxious to achieve the widest possible consensus at this critical stage of the process. . Issues already raised with my Department are being used to inform the overall scope for the Commission.

I am currently engageing further with opposition spokespersons and other stakeholders in order to update them on the emerging issues and to seek any further views they may have. Such an inclusive approach will assist Government in establishing an effective inquiry and I am confident that we can conclude this important phase of the process in a timely manner.

Following the finalisation of the terms of reference, it is my intention to bring a Memorandum to Government as soon as possible thereafter setting out the arrangements for the Commission. I will then be in a position to return to both Houses with a draft resolution seeking Oireachtas approval to establish the Commission.

Question 3 (Deputy Clare Daly)

To ask the Minister for Children & Youth Affairs to implement an emergency plan of action to deal with the problems which have beset the Child & Family Agency since its inception, particularly the chronic understaffing which has resulted in 9000 at risk children awaiting the allocation of a social worker?

The Child and Family Agency was successfully established on 1st January, 2014. The scale of organisational change involved in establishing the Agency was enormous. It involved bringing together nearly 3,800 staff from three separate organisations, the HSE, the Family Support Agency and the National Educational Welfare Board. The establishment of the new Agency represented one of the most ambitious and far reaching public sector reforms undertaken by the Government.

The Child and Family Agency was allocated €609 million in its first year of operation. This is made up of €602 million in current funding and €7 million in capital funding.

The Agency is implementing a wide ranging and necessary programme of reform of child welfare and protection services. Particular areas which have received priority attention in 2014 include:

• Continuing roll out of national standardised business processes, generating more reliable and consistent data to reflect service demand, outputs and outcomes;

• A stronger focus on aligning of resources to ensure that referrals are subject to initial assessment, prioritisation and response in line with national policies;

• Developing practice framework that coordinates child protection services with family support services in order to direct an appropriate response to the level of concern expressed. This has been made possible by the development of national agreed thresholds for different services, with dedicated pathways for the management of referrals;

• Developing of a commissioning strategy to ensure that services funded by the Agency are clearly focussed on specific outcomes for children and families and are demonstrably cost effective and efficient;

• Developing plans to roll-out a social work on call out-of hours service throughout the country;

• Ongoing development of a Quality Assurance Framework for child welfare and protection to support improved outcomes for children and families as lessons are learned from external inspections and reviews and internal reviews impact on resource allocation and practice.

I have acknowledged that delivering the range of services required of the Agency is challenging as a result of demographic and social factors. This has been reflected most recently in a report prepared by the Agency, titled 'Measuring the Pressure'.

That Report indicates that at the end of June 2014, the Agency was providing 19,766 children with a social work service. The Report also highlights the increasing service challenge facing the Agency, with 9,548 cases waiting to be allocated to a dedicated social worker.

Approximately one third of these, (3,240 cases), were deemed to be high priority. These cases represent a mix of new referrals that need further assessment and social work input, as well as children known to the Agency who need a continuing social work service. I am assured by the Agency that emergency cases are dealt with immediately and that high priority cases are kept under review. I am determined to ensure that the most vulnerable children in our society receive a timely and appropriate response.

The data and analysis contained in "Measuring the Pressure" prepared by the Agency as a management report, provides critical information to assist the Agency in service planning and resource allocation.

The Agency received funding of €6.7m in 2014 to alleviate identified service pressures and to support the continuing implementation of the reform programme across children and family services.

This funding is being targeted at a number of areas, including the replacement of staff on maternity leave by way of a 12 month temporary contract. Latest figures indicate that at the end of September, 160 staff were on maternity leave, 77 of whom were social workers. The Agency is also finalising proposals for the introduction of a guaranteed and protected one year induction programme for newly qualified social workers.

These initiatives are designed to assist the Agency in responding to identified service pressures and to provide for a targeted response to such pressures, taking account of identified need and available resources.

On foot of Budget 2015, the Agency will have a budget of €635 million, including over €12 million in capital funding. This represents an increase of €26 million - or 4.3% - over the 2014 budget. This additional funding will allow the Agency to build on the extensive programme of reform that is already underway across services for children and families.

These additional resources will be vitally important in alleviating pressures on services - right across child welfare and protection services, for example in supporting implementation of Children First on a statutory basis - and will be used to build on initiatives commenced by the Agency this year.

Tusla has already embarked on a programme of reform designed to realise the benefits of cost containment and to ensure that everyone using Tusla services experiences a consistent - and high quality - standard of service. The additional funding made available in Budget 2015 will enable the Agency to consolidate and build on this work, which will bring all services into a single National Service Delivery Model.

Question 4 (Deputy Clare Daly)

To ask the Minister for Children & Youth Affairs to make a statement regarding the long promised Adoption & Tracing Legislation, which previous Ministers committed to delivering long before now and whether it will be before the House in 2014?

The Minister’s legislative priority in the area of adoption is the preparation of information and tracing legislation. In addition, the Department is also working closely with the Department of Justice and Equality on the Children and Family Relationships Bill, which it is proposed will contain measures in relation to guardianship and adoption by civil partners.

It is intended to proceed to finalise legislative proposals so that general scheme and Heads of Bill on adoption information and tracing can be brought to the Government as soon as possible with a view to early publication. Subsequent consideration by the Oireachtas Health and Children Committee will allow the issues to be carefully teased out and the views of different interested parties on these important and sensitive matters to be fully considered.

Work on the drafts head of an Adoption (Information and Tracing) Bill will be finalised as soon as possible and submitted for the consideration of Government, in advance of referral to the Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children. The overall policy objective in bringing forward proposed legislation on adoption information and tracing has always been to provide access to as much information as possible to adopted persons.

As has been stated previously, complex legal and constitutional issues have arisen in the drafting of the Bill. A particular challenge has arisen in the attempt to reconcile an adopted person’s request for information about his or her identity with the right to privacy of his or her birth parent where consent has not been provided. I have been attempting to tease out precisely how this can be done in the context of what I must state is extremely strong legal advice about the constitutional protection of the rights of the natural mother to privacy. I continue to explore how far the Government can go in building into legislation that right of the adopted person to get access to information without breaching the Constitution. This is the reason it is taking this length of time to draft the Heads of Bill. I am fully committed to bringing forward as progressive an approach as possible within these parameters. I have also asked officials to review the Bill published by Averil Power on this matter.

In any event it is intended that the Bill will provide for;

• Placing the National Adoption Contact Preference Register on a statutory basis
• Arrange for the management of Adoption Records
• Setting out the information to be provided and circumstances in which it can be provided both for retrospective and prospective adoptions.
• Information and Tracing Supports

Operational Arrangements

In order to support the provision of information as now proposed a significant additional support for operational arrangements will be required. It is the intention to address both legal and operational arrangements, although the latter will certainly raise resource issues, which it will be necessary for the Department, in developing final proposals, to quantify with the Child and Family Agency and the Adoption Authority.

The Minister intends examining, in consultation with the Adoption Authority and the Child and Family Agency, the current organisational arrangements for records management and facilitation of access with a view to identifying how these can be improved upon in the short term. The examination will extend to a review of arrangements in place in other selected jurisdictions to inform proposals for revised organisational arrangements. These consultations will also consider issues such as mediation and counselling to facilitate those accessing the service.

The Department has established an Information and Tracing Project team that is examining, in consultation with the Adoption Authority and the Child and Family Agency and stakeholders, the current organisational arrangements for records management and facilitation of access with a view to identifying how they can be improved upon in the short term.

Question 5 (Deputy Eamon Maloney)

To ask the Minister to reverse the cut in funding of 6.5% for all School Completion Programme.

The School Completion Programme aims to retain young people in the formal education system to completion of senior cycle and to generally improve their school attendance, participation and their retention in education. The programme is a targeted intervention, which is aimed at those school communities which are identified through the Department of Education and Skills’ DEIS Action Plan for Educational Inclusion. The programme involves 124 locally managed projects and related initiatives which operate across 470 primary and 224 post-primary schools. It provides targeted supports to some 36,000 children and young people who may be at risk of educational disadvantage.

The projects within the School Completion Programme are each managed and directed by a Local Management Committee, which includes representatives of schools, parents, and other education stakeholders in the locality. The programme's project model approach gives local communities the autonomy to devise innovative approaches to address the needs of young people most at risk of early school leaving. Typically, projects offer homework clubs; breakfast clubs; mentoring programmes; learning support; social and personal development programmes to young people and out of school supports including music, art and sports and a range of activities during holiday periods.