Mr. Mike Allen:

I thank the committee for inviting us to come before it on what is an historic day. The Dáil has frequently debated the deaths of children in care and those who grew up in care and looked at our sad history in this regard. To have committee members sitting around looking for the first time at legislation that aims to make the future better is extremely welcome. It is not only a tribute to the Minister and committee members discussing it, but also to our colleagues in the Child and Family Agency and the Department who have brought it to this stage.

Focus Ireland has worked on this issue for more than 15 years because our homeless services repeatedly come across young people, and older people, who are homeless largely as a result of their experience of growing up in care and inadequate follow-on. It is important to be clear that a large number of young people who grow up in care move into independent adulthood with only the usual issues which affect young people and the difficulties we all face in becoming adults. We must not stigmatise all those in care, but we need to focus on the substantial number of people who need care and support to proceed into adulthood. Historically, when we have failed them we have done so extremely badly, and we need to ensure the legislation changes this once and for all. We will continue to work with the older people who still suffer from the neglect of the past but we must ensure a new generation does not join them.

Young people need a range of emotional and physical supports, which my colleagues have discussed. Before these mean anything, one needs a secure place to live, to call a home, to return to at night and to build one's life around. It is the risk of homelessness that has brought Focus Ireland to this issue, and that is what I want to address.

One aspect of aftercare is the development of life skills. These need to be built throughout the period of care and specifically from the age of 16. My colleagues from EPIC have outlined this and we strongly endorse this position. Equally important is the physical provision of bricks and mortar and a roof over one's head. As a society we respond to these in two ways. The first of these is to provide actual homes for people through residential aftercare. To our knowledge, approximately 80 such housing units are available and approximately half of these are provided by Focus Ireland. The aftercare lasts approximately six months and involves an aftercare worker who supports the person in moving into the open housing market.

The second way, for those who do not get a place in a residential home, is that they must move straight from care into an independent home of their own. Given the way our social housing has developed, as it was never been designed to support the needs of young people, they will find their homes in the private rented market. There is no need to tell any constituency Deputy or Senator the difficulties in the private rented market throughout the country. A professional who has just lost his or her job and needs to provide a home for himself or herself has a nightmare trying to get a decent home to live in. How much more of a nightmare is it for a young person who does not have life experience? It has been a nightmare for my children, who are the same age as the young people we are discussing. For children who grew up in care and do not receive emotional advice or financial support from a parent, the chances of getting things wrong and of things going seriously wrong are absolutely enormous.

Focus Ireland has been dealing with this issue for approximately 13 years. Back then, a number of people we worked with in aftercare or quasi-aftercare positions were homeless. Over a period of time, all of the agencies involved transformed this situation. Three years ago - I am picking that time as an example - the organisation was confident that all the young people we were working with had a secure place to stay. At present, our services in Dublin deal with approximately 100 people. Of these, ten are experiencing adult life in emergency homeless hostels. They are homeless. A further 28 are in unsuitable accommodation and three have returned to their families of origin without any assessment of whether the risk that led to their being taken into care has been resolved.

I have been working with Focus Ireland for more than four years. These circumstances remind me of what I read in the history of the organisation. I also read in that history the consequences for the young people. This will not be solved. I very much endorse what the witnesses from the Child and Family Agency stated. These are problems that the agency cannot resolve. It is not its responsibility, as it is not the responsibility of an aftercare worker to change the housing market or reform it. To some extent it is the responsibility of committee members as elected representatives, but this responsibility was passed on to local authorities and the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government.

The question for us is what can be put into the legislation which triggers the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government and local authorities to respond more positively to these young people than they do at present and in a way they need. A young person who knows he or she will leave care cannot regularly or safely get a housing needs assessment from the local authority. Without this, he or she cannot receive rent supplement on the day he or she turns 18. That is when he or she must start the process. An example committee members might take is how the Department of Social Protection amended its basic legislation when it cut the rate of social welfare to young people.

That legislation was amended in order that the cut would not apply to young people who had grown up in care. It is a case in which the primary legislation, affecting one of the key agencies on which these young people rely, was changed. This change was made by the Department of Social Protection because the Department of Children and Youth Affairs did not exist at the time. We are requesting the Department of Children and Youth Affairs to seek legal advice on the aspects of primary legislation that affect the key agencies which, as they have indicated, can be changed to ensure a young person who has had an assessment of needs completed can walk into the Department of Education and Skills to access a grant. We must have the changes in place in order that when they need a home, the local authority official does not send then away because they have a form with the wrong logo and must start the process all over again. This must not be an assessment of young people who have grown up in care but of what we need to do as a society to help them to move to adulthood. It is not a mark against them, rather it is mark against us if we fail to deliver. That must be borne in mind when we develop the legislation. We must ensure we are not testing young people but ourselves in the process. Given the number of young people who leave care, it is possible for us to arrange the system such that they are offered the same protection that we afford to our own children.

I thank the Chairman and members for their time and hope we will be able to continue the discussion on the legislation before its enactment.