Maurice Quinlivan (Limerick City, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank Ms Duggan for her presentation. I have two questions. Mr. Brophy has kind of answered one of them but I will expand on that as we go forward.

As for my first question, in her presentation, one aspect Ms Duggan touched on was Traveller family care and the efforts to recruit Traveller foster families. A supporting document we got notes that 142 members of that community have engaged in a four-year period and only two have been approved as foster carers. Would the witnesses deem this to have been a successful exercise? What, in their view, is needed to expand the number of members of the Traveller community involved in the action? I know Mr. Brophy outlined that but he might expand on it in a moment.

As for my second question, having read Tusla's opening statement, one of the striking but not surprising things from it was the issue of a lack of trust from the Traveller community towards Tusla and the commitment of Tusla to building trust with that community. What do the witnesses say are the key barriers Tusla is encountering in fostering that trust and what have they found successful in fostering it? Could they also roughly explain the Values Lab report of 2023? What was that about and could they expand on it a small bit?