Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Minister has asked me to convey a number of points to the House on this matter. I refer to her activities since assuming responsibility for the children detention system in January 2012.

The Minister for Children and Youth Affairs has worked with her colleagues in Government on a range of actions to improve conditions for children in detention and in particular, to end the practice of detaining children in St. Patrick's Institution and to transfer them to Oberstown. She announced a capital investment package in April 2011 to achieve that in Lusk, County Dublin. This will result in sufficient capacity to extend the child care model of detention to all young people under the age of 18 years by mid 2014.

In consultation with her colleague, the Minister for Justice and Equality, the Minister extended the remit of the Ombudsman for Children from July 2012 to include all boys less than 18 years of age detained in St. Patrick's Institution. A number of other measures have yet to be implemented as part of the Government's programme and we look forward to working with the Children's Rights Alliance and other NGOs to achieve those objectives.

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