Mr. Albert O'Donoghue:

I thank the members of the committee and the representatives of the NGOs, Mr. McBride and Ms Mugan, for attending. When an issue like this is debated and the views of all parties are sought and received, it makes our job of trying to craft something at the centre a lot easier.

The legislation gives visibility to the cohort of children that we are trying to support in aftercare which did not happen in the past. We hope, and are reasonably confident, that it will address the consistency issues that were touched on by Deputy McLellan regarding living on one side of the river and what a person may or may not get in assessment and the various plans that would ensue. As a corollary, we hope that it removes the ambiguity around who is eligible for the aftercare process and the assessment of need that would preclude that from happening.

Senators and Deputies raised a number of themes, which is the best way of describing them, during the course of the discussion and I shall try to touch on all of them briefly. In terms of eligibility, and I return to the point made by Deputy McLellan, it is quite hard to define eligibility but we have tried to keep it as broad as possible. It took quite a while to figure out how we could incorporate the various cohorts of children into these definitions. There has been some talk here that it is restrictive but I can provide an example of the structure. For example, what happens when a child, in the previous five years prior to presentation to the agency, has had 12 months consecutive care. That means a child, upon reaching the age of 16, presenting to the agency. Therefore, we would have to go back to the time when the child was 11 or 12 years old and look at his or her care record. I am of the view that in terms of what is in play at the moment, and what we are suggesting here, there has been quite a shift in terms of the cohort of children that would become eligible for the aftercare planning process.

A lot of talk centred around inter-agency co-operation. Mr. Allen and some of the members drew attention to the fact that this is not all within the gift of our colleagues in the Child and Family Agency to deliver. I drew reference, albeit passing, in my opening remarks to a series of bilaterals which we hope to kick off with our colleagues in other Departments in order to examine how we might move these issues along and have proper cognisance, from their perspective, of the cohort of children that we seek to support. That would be the opening salvo in moving towards something which Mr. McBride alluded to, in terms of memos of understanding and service level agreements, but I see it as something further down the road. We need to get their radar attuned to the fact that there is a small but vulnerable cohort of children who need to avail of the services that are distinctly within their bailiwick to deliver.

The voice of the child was raised regarding use of the phrase "as appropriate" in the draft heads before the committee today. Everything that the agency does is governed by section 9 which says that the voice of the child must be considered, due weight and regard having to be had of the maturity of that particular child. The phrase "as appropriate" was used in the legislative provision so that an absolute obligation is not placed on the agency in relation to children or young people that it cannot track down. Where it engages with children it is bound by section 9 - and I believe this is something Deputy Ó Caoláin was passionate about during the debate on the Child and Family Agency Bill prior to Christmas - but it still stands. This is a technicality to deal with cases where a child disengages from the system, cannot be tracked down or does not wish to engage. The phraseology used does not place an obligation on the agency to deal with a child who does not want to engage. It does not in any way, shape or form detract from the agency's obligation to have due regard to the voice of the child.

There was a brief mention of detention and aftercare. One third of children who enter detention do so under court order, a further 25% to 30% are well known to the Child and Family Agency and, if memory serves me correctly regarding a passing discussion with one of my colleagues, a social worker has been allocated. Approximately 60% or so would, in the main, qualify under the provisions, as we have crafted them here, for aftercare planning.

With regard to the inter-agency issue, the residual cohort in detention are catered for by an agreement between the probation service and the Children and Family Agency to look after those children. A process and protocol are already in play. That means that if they do not fall within the remit of this provision they will be picked up on the other side.

There was another question but I may have misheard Ms Ward. As far as I am aware, a child can be adopted up to the age of 18. Is that what Ms Ward said, or did she say "not up to the age of 18"? I ask both questions in order to seek clarification.