Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I will respond to the Chair's last point first. As she knows, Tusla are bringing forward three strategies in alternative care. The first is for residential care, the second for foster care, and the third one is for aftercare. That last one should be coming out in the next number of months. It might be useful for us, and maybe even someone from Tusla could come for a session with the committee, to go through that in a little more detail when it is fresh. Since 2017, we have a good basis for an aftercare system in the country but it is undoubtedly imperfect. I am uncomfortable with that kind of difference in treatment between those who go into education and those who do not, in terms of recognising the fact that at that age of 21, people have to make different choices. An education choice then might not be for everyone at that time while someone might come back to something later on. That difference does not always sit easily with me.

The Chair is right in that it is almost always our preference to keep children with their families. The range of supports Tusla rolls out is significant, particularly in terms of the suite of parenting supports. We launched something last summer related to parent supports. Some of these are on the mild level of support. It is not really intervention, but more support. Those graduated levels of intervention are really important. Tusla is very much of the view that by and large it is best to keep children with their families. It is only in those exceptional cases where there is that real need. There are many cases where Tusla has to intervene but where we can avoid that, we do.