Dr. Finbar Markey:

I thank those in attendance today, both elected representatives and staff. I have worked in the social care field and with adolescents in residential care for over a decade. I hold an honours degree in applied social care and I have a masters degree and a research PhD in organisational culture change in public social and health care in Ireland.

The organisational culture of Tusla is clearly in need of a serious overhaul. The failings that are identified by HIQA's less than satisfactory assessment procedures, coupled with the experiences of mothers in contact with our alliance, point to an organisational culture that evolved from crisis and is pathological in many aspects of its practice. The espoused beliefs and values of the organisation, the ethical aspirations that are reduced to the promising slogans we see in marketing campaigns, in many instances are not to be found in practice.

The real-time culture of an organisation can be shielded from public view and external assessment through naive faith in espoused beliefs, myth-based slogans or go-to explanations of failure, such as “There is no funding”, and oversight procedures that are dependent on quantitative statistical data over qualitative assessment tools. The compulsion within a failing organisation and among high-ranking members of staff to conceal and redirect blame, and to defend themselves at all costs, creates a pathology within organisations that manifests toxic environments and reduces the service user to “problem” status.

It is clear the organisational culture of Tusla is woefully incongruent. The basic principles of the organisation, such as the protection of children, are not being achieved in many instances. Equally, the founding principle of aiming to keep families together has been long forgotten. Tusla, or whatever organisation replaces Tusla in the future, must go through a rebirthing process, a return to the espoused values and principles of the organisation and a rejection of the self-protectionism and abuses that have brought us to appear before this committee today.

I will pass over to Ms Monaghan.