Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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I thank everyone for coming in. There are huge challenges within the system. I see it daily. I see people who cannot get GPs, occupational therapists, physiotherapy or dieticians. There are huge challenges. The one thing we have to do is make sure children are prioritised. Whether it comes to vaccinations or medical cards, we have to make sure that every child who enters our country is looked after. I see the challenges. I deal with them daily. A woman who has a medical card contacted me today; she cannot get a dentist. There are so many issues with recruiting and retaining staff, which was brought up. I live in CHO 5 where the Chair and I see huge challenges. I see them daily. An issue we need to look at is that of more GPs across the board. We need to get more GPs. This issue is on a national and government level but we need to sort out these issues to help sort out all the other issues we have.

My question for Tusla concerns what it outlined in its statement: "Tusla and the Children’s Rights Alliance are also jointly commissioning research into identifying integrated family support approaches for families living in the International Protection accommodation system, to inform how we can better support them." How much of this is done? There are so many challenges. Listening to the stories today, I am worried. Every child and person is so important. There is a huge lack of communication and information. Where I have serious issues, just from my point of view, concerns working with different agencies. We have Tusla, the Minister, the Minister for Health, the Minister for Justice and the HSE. Significant challenges come with that. That brings its own challenges as regards joined-up thinking and communication. What happens within the different Departments? Are they all on the one page? From here, how do they try to make it better? It is not right and we know that. We are sitting here because we know it is not right.

Staff are doing their best. I deal with the HSE daily, and I work with Tusla and the Department, as does everyone else. How do we sort the challenges out? We are all here for the good. How do we sit down and work together? On education, a school in the area where I live, which is delighted it has migrant children, has lost a teacher. I am approaching to the Departments, which are telling me money is there but there are recruitment and staff issues, it is trying to do this and that, and there is money for this. Yet, where I live in County Carlow, I have challenges every day and there is just no joined-up thinking.

My other area of huge concern is that of children with disabilities. How are we monitoring children with disabilities? What are we doing to make sure that no child with a disability who enters this country is being left unseen or has not accessed the GP care or vaccinations he or she needs? Those are the concerns I see. I work with all the different agencies and with different groups. As I said, while good work is being done, how do we work better? How do the representatives see us facing the challenges? What will happen with this? The Minister of State, Deputy Joe O'Brien, launched an action plan against racism in March, along with implementation of it.

The Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth has said it will continue this. I know it has been only three months but have there been changes? If so, where are the changes? If we are losing teachers while we are trying to promote action, and we are not doing things correctly through the various Departments, how will we find solutions for the challenges we have? As I have said, all of our children have to be looked after. It does not matter where they come from, every child is special and every child should be a priority and be looked after.