Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to take part in this debate. This is an important opportunity for this House to take stock, for the Government to outline the actions it has taken and to discuss the challenges that remain. We must all continue to work to improve the lot of Irish citizens. While I understand the role of the Opposition, it is disappointing that a number of Deputies have come into the House and made not one reference to the Government's achievements. They did not refer, for example, to the change in the job situation where, instead of losing 7,000 per month, 5,000 jobs are being created. They made no reference whatsoever to the changes in the public finances, in Ireland's international reputation or to what we are being charged in interest when we borrow. They made no reference to the various reforms that are taking place, not least in the areas of health, local government and social welfare. No mention was made of the focus on activation in the Department of Social Protection which means that people are no longer passive recipients of money but are given the opportunity to participate in training and education programmes. This Government has taken action on many fronts. There is no doubt that many challenges remain, but at least when Deputy Mary Lou McDonald addressed the House, she commented on the legacy issues which this Government had to face when it took office.

I will focus this morning on my own area and the initiatives that I have taken in driving forward the range of Government commitments as they relate to children and families. We are in the midst of an ambitious reform agenda because our aim for children and families is to change fundamentally how services are delivered to them. We are working to integrate those services, to allow those services to respond earlier and to allow for joined-up thinking and a degree of independence not previously afforded in the context of service delivery. I will take this opportunity to comment on some of the initiatives I have taken and to lay out the challenges that remain. I am certainly not complacent and do not think that reform in the areas I have mentioned can happen overnight. What is important is to be on the right pathway to achieving the goals which the Government has set out and which I, as Minister, have set out for my own area.

I have delivered on a number of key programme for Government commitments, including holding the children's referendum, establishing the dedicated new Child and Family Agency and securing funding for and commencing work on new national child detention facilities. The latter is important because it takes all 16 and 17 years olds out of the prison service. We are now beginning to have a debate about what happens to those under 25 in our prison service but certainly taking 16 and 17 year olds out of the prison system is extremely important and has been advocated for more than 50 years. This Government has delivered on that commitment at a time of unprecedented financial difficulty. We have put our money into ensuring that 16 and 17 year olds will not be in prison facilities, thereby increasing the chances that those young people will not continue in a life of crime but will get a second chance. This is an extremely important initiative and in a time of extreme financial difficulty, we decided that it was a priority to try to interrupt that cycle of crime for young people and to give them a real opportunity for a second chance.

The free pre-school year is an extremely important initiative introduced by the previous Government. It was very difficult to sustain that service at a time of such economic difficulty but we have done so and have provided an additional €15 million to deal with population increases. The free pre-school year is extremely important and I am delighted that we have been able to maintain it. Huge concerns have been expressed about the quality standards in our early years services and that is certainly a problem. Previous governments have focused too much on bricks and mortar and did not invest in training and supporting front-line workers and ensuring that they are qualified for their roles. That is what this Government is focusing on to ensure the quality of our early years services because that is what parents want. We saw what was exposed on the "Prime Time" programme recently, which is a legacy of many years. The situation will not be turned around overnight but I am determined that we will introduce quality standards, training and inspections because that combination will make a difference so that parents can trust in the services they are using. The Government is also investing €30 million, with support from philanthropy, in area-based childhood programmes in 12 areas around the country where children are most in need. We have also completed a promised review of the implementation of the youth homelessness strategy.

There is much more that needs to be done and I will highlight, briefly, my priorities for the coming year. I will be publishing the Children First Bill shortly - it is going to Cabinet in the coming weeks. We will complete the development of the child detention facilities. I want to support and develop the work of the recently-established Child and Family Agency, one of the biggest public-sector reforms in which this Government has been involved. I will be amending the Child Care Act in respect of after care. I recently secured Government agreement that social workers would carry out an assessment of the need for after care for those children in the care of the State at the moment, who number 6,200. I will launch Ireland's first every early years strategy and a policy on family supports and parenting.

We know parenting is a complex task and we want to see what the State can do to support it.

I will continue quality improvements in early years and child care services. I will enhance the preservation, management and access to adoption records. This has been on the agenda since 1999. I will bring forward legislation to improve access to those records and ensure they are managed properly. So far, they have been dispersed across the country. I will bring in legislation to ensure that those who hold records have a statutory obligation to declare they have them. We will bring those records together, preserve and manage them and improve access to them.

My Department is finalising the Children First Bill which will place elements of the Children First national guidance on a statutory basis. This was first promised in 1999 and promised again under the Ryan implementation report in 2009 but not delivered. That will be delivered this year.

This year the priorities of the Child and Family Agency will include recruiting additional social workers in line with the additional budget allocations in budget 2014; rolling out new models for dealing with child abuse and neglect cases, of which there were 42,000 last year, with better liaison with the voluntary sector; commencing a three-year plan to double the number of special care places; and delivering greater efficiencies and savings in legal costs. What is happening in this area is not sustainable. There will be a national approach to legal costs and the guardian ad litemsystem will be reformed. We will also introduce 24-hour access social work services.

In the past few days, I approved this year's business plan for the Child and Family Agency. The heads of the aftercare amendment Bill were submitted to the Cabinet last week and will be referred to the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Health and Children on 11 March. This is another example of implementation of a policy that has been called for by many groups who care about young people.

I welcome the opportunity to update the House on my plans and challenges for the year ahead. I want to build on the momentum achieved and to deliver on our commitments. There are significant challenges but I am committed to rising to them, delivering valued improvements to services for children and families. Many of these initiatives have got support from all sides of the House. I welcome that support and the constructive discussions we have had on many of them. I wish the debate in this House was as constructive as some of the support I have got for the initiatives I brought forward, however. It is extremely important for the people that when we are debating in this House we recognise the initiatives that have been taken that make a difference in the jobs arena and other areas, as well as the challenges that remain.

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