Jillian van Turnhout (Independent) | Oireachtas source

As always, the Minister, Deputy James Reilly, is very welcome, as are his officials. I acknowledge the considerable strides that have been made in recent years in the area of children. We should not forget that when we consider the strategy, the agency and the many commitments. My impatience is due for the need for us to move to the implementation and outcomes for children to ensure the changes have the effect we want, and that we are not just discussing it on paper.

The Minister referred to Children First. Could he explain the reason for the delay in the legislation? I followed the Second Stage debate in the Dáil at the end of April and I would have thought the Bill would move quickly to Committee Stage. I wish to understand the reason we cannot move further because a statutory basis is particularly important in so many areas.

The second area I wish to raise relates to how the committee interacts with the Child and Family Agency. I asked the Minister and the previous Minister if we could have a formal engagement. It would be logical for us to do that in the context of the periodic review with the Minister. It is absolutely critical that we have a very clear and structured engagement with the Child and Family Agency. It is not good enough that we have seen the agency only once this year and it is now November. I wish to put that on record.

I acknowledge the response I received to Question No. 11 which was about homeless children. We read that any child under the age of 16 will go into care and 16 year olds and 17 year olds are “typically more challenging”. I refer to young people who leave care settings. They are more challenging because we as a State have failed them on so many occasions. We have added to their challenges. They probably do not have the mental health supports they need or access to the services they need. They have been failed on several occasions and we continue to fail them by not having the aftercare Bill, to which I know the Minister is committed. The committee reviewed the heads of the Bill very quickly. We must move much more quickly on the issue and ensure that every child is addressed.

It is remiss of us that there are homeless children in the country. We should not accept that. We should get out of the rut of accepting that a certain number of children will be homeless. We must see whether we can do more. I would encourage the Minister to put in place the aftercare Bill. That is part of the reason for wanting engagement with the agency. We must consider what else we can do to ensure children do not get to that precarious situation where we have to read about them in the review panel reports.

I raised child and adolescent mental health services in the Seanad again with the Minister of State, Deputy Kathleen Lynch, because I continue to be concerned about social workers not being able to access the services in a timely and appropriate way. She said she now questions her judgment about whether the service should be moved into the Child and Family Agency. We must ensure the services are in place.

I welcome that the heads of the adoption Bill are due. The difficulty is that in January 2012 the then Minister told us the Bill was forthcoming. For that reason I co-sponsored a Bill with Senators Power and Healy Eames on information on identify which is due to go before the Seanad next Wednesday. We have worked hard to strike a balance. I hope the Minister will give us a fair hearing. Many people are waiting for information on their identity. The difficulty is that for those who wish to make contact, many of the women are getting older as time ticks on and I am most concerned with the delay on this important issue.

When will the 2013 special rapporteur report be published? In response to Deputy Pringle in October, the Minister said it was his intention to lay it before the House in the near future. I accept the Bill has gone out to consultation to the various Departments but when will the Bill be published. In addition, will it show which recommendations are being accepted by Departments or on which they wish to take a different approach? I raised the issue with the then Minister, Deputy Frances Fitzgerald, last year. We are on the seventh special rapporteur report. The reports are valuable but how do we know what happens to the recommendations they contain?

The final issue relates to Questions Nos. 9 and 10 that I asked, which relate to early childhood education. The Minister is well aware I am chair of Early Childhood Ireland. I do not speak in that capacity today but I must declare the interest. I welcome the response on special needs but the reality, as the Minister is aware, is that a child will need additional and appropriate support and to say that it will be two days a week for one year and three days a week in the following year does not meet the needs of the child. We must revisit the situation and examine the flexibility and how we are going to do it.

I also inquired about the inspection regimes for child care settings, of which there are four, namely, the Child and Family Agency, the Department of Education and Skills, Pobal and also an environmental health inspection. The difficulty is the lack of consistency. The child care settings welcome an inspection regime but not four different inspection regimes. One centre told me three inspectors arrived this week at the same time to spend an entire day there. How is one supposed to cope with that? Has a regulatory impact assessment been done to examine the inspection of child care settings and are we absolutely clear about what we expect? I heard of two cases this week of centres that were fully compliant last year which were told they are not compliant because of Garda vetting. If one has worked out of the State previously, vetting and checking from another state is required. One woman who worked 25 years ago in the United States has been told her service is non-compliant because she does not have an FBI check for her time 25 years ago in the USA. I would worry if I was a parent who heard a centre was non-compliant.

My final point relates to the pressure on early childhood centres due to rates bills. I will raise the matter in the Seanad with the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Brendan Howlin, and the Minister of State, Deputy Simon Harris. In one case where 90% of the service involves State-provided services, the centre received a rates bill of €13,000. The State sets the amount of money one gets per child and the space one must have. All the regulations are set by the State and one is not allowed to charge any extra money. Although 90% of the set-up is regulated by the State and one is not allowed to charge any extra money, the centre could receive a bill for €13,000. I have heard similar stories around the country. Many child care centres are close closing and I am fearful that will happen. We must make it viable for centres to provide a quality, affordable service.