Ms Patricia Finlay:

The complexity of cases is relevant. The Deputy asked a question about Tusla inheriting legacy issues. She mentioned how, at times, we have been hammered for various things. In many ways we welcome the opportunity to be here to talk about positive initiatives the agency is undertaking. I am keen to mention something we can really be proud of as an agency. The investigations and the work we are doing have found that we provide a child-centred service. We are passionate about ensuring the voices of children and parents are heard in everything we do. It is vital that their voices are heard in how we deliver services. They can influence the way we work.

One example is that we have invested significantly in the training of staff with regard to child participation. We are keen to ensure that, at all times, this is a cornerstone of our culture. At present within Tusla we have 45 teams throughout the country. These teams have been awarded an independent quality mark called the Investing in Children Membership Award. Those responsible for the quality mark have independently verified that Tusla staff are doing really good strong child participatory work.

The Deputy asked about the caseload. I have been a social worker and a social work manager. A social worker may be allocated 12 children in care. Of those 12 children in care, it may be that six are really settled in foster care. They may be doing really well, going to school and may be really attached to their foster carers. There may be no court work linked to such cases. The social worker will have a role to visit the child and ensure that the placement is meeting the needs of the child in question. In contrast, a social worker might have four children in the caseload who are in real difficulty and who have really strong presentation of trauma. They may be presenting with complex needs. Their foster carers or family may be really struggling. Such cases may take far more time. That is why we have brought in our caseload management system. This something we are leading on throughout Europe with our caseload management system. The idea is to provide a weighting to different types of cases. We provide a reduced caseload weighting for our newer graduates. Again, it is about retaining them and ensuring they have a manageable workload.