Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú) | Oireachtas source

The last number of weeks have been shocking to people. The scandals that have emanated from Sinn Féin daily have been incredible. The conviction of an ex-Sinn Féin press officer, Michael McGonagle, for child sex offences has horrified people. The incredible way that it was handled is stunning. That there is not the necessary cop-on, common sense and decency for two very senior individuals in the press office not to have done what they did is amazing. It is also incredible that the necessary protections were not in place to prevent that when their judgment failed them.

There is a defensive "us against them" instinct within Sinn Féin which is, to be honest, a legacy of the Troubles. It feeds into the instinct to protect the party over other things. There is also an incredibly centralised decision-making process within the party. Not only does that slow down decision-making, it also reduces the competency of many senior officials because they are so unused to making decisions for themselves. How all this was handled by the leadership, in a drip-feed fashion, is also incredible. The current leadership of Sinn Féin are not backwards in coming forwards to hammer other political parties when they have done wrong, and rightly so, but they are not living up to the high standards they set for others. I know from talking to many supporters and members of Sinn Féin around the country that they are also horrified by the lack of leadership in Sinn Féin in recent years.

It must also be said that it is quite shocking that we are only having a debate on the issue of child protection in this Chamber when it is politically charged. There is significant hypocrisy bouncing off the chairs in this Chamber today. I feel sick to my very stomach that we only get a debate on child protection when it is in the context of the political events that have happened in the past two weeks. I have looked around the Chamber at the Government benches and have seen people who have not been here for weeks. I see them chomping at the political bit. I see tweets from Regina Doherty, MEP and press statements from Deputy Ciaran Cannon and the Minister of State, Deputy Carroll MacNeill, has condemned Sinn Féin for what they have done but people should not be fooled into thinking this Government is concerned for the well-being of children around this country.

The reason I am so frustrated is that for the last five years I have been raising the issue of child protection in this House and I have been stonewalled by Ministers. When I table general questions, I am told that they are too vague and cannot be answered. When I table detailed questions, I am told they are too specific, that individuals could be identified as a result and they are not answered. When Tusla or An Garda Síochána release information it is often intentionally complicated and convoluted, making it impossible to decipher. In some cases, Tusla and An Garda Síochána have given me documents and both are completely contradictory. I watched the Minister of State, Deputy Browne, ram legislation through this House that greatly reduced the penalty for criminal exploitation of children. He was enabled in doing so by the Opposition, as well as Government backbenchers, who did not bother to show up for the debate.

Statistics released to Aontú in response to parliamentary questions show that nearly 200 children who were either in State care or known to the State have died in the past decade. Of this number, 38 died by taking their own lives, while more died from drug overdoses. Eleven of those deaths were murders, which means that 5% of all of the children who died in State care or who were known to State care services were murdered. That is an incredible figure, as I am sure the Minister of State will agree. We know that the number of children who are being referred to Tusla now on an annual basis is almost at 100,000. This is double what it was in 2018. To put that in context, about 60,000 children are sitting their leaving certificate and right now we are referring 100,000 children on an annual basis to Tusla.

Children in State care and those known to State care services are being trafficked and sexually exploited in Ireland right now at a serious scale. In other countries this would be a national scandal. The resources of those countries would be marshalled instantaneously to deal with the issue on a comprehensive basis and there would be accountability. There would be resignations at the very top. When I brought up the issue of hypocrisy, some of the Ministers and Ministers of State opposite had puzzled, quizzical expressions on their faces but I will get to the specifics of this now. Special emergency accommodation arrangements, which consist of unregulated accommodation in this State, mostly by third-party providers in rented accommodation, are being used by Tusla to accommodate children in State care. We know from reports in the media that there are serious questions in relation to the vetting of the people working in this area and the providers of those special emergency arrangements. There is a shortage of foster placements coupled with a consistent underfunding of private and voluntary sector services, which has made Tusla more reliant on those dodgy companies to protect vulnerable children. Children in State care, particularly residential care, are being left hugely exposed. Child sexual exploitation is the biggest form of human trafficking in Ireland at the moment and is happening in real time among children who are supposed to be in the care of the State. In recent years a number of people have tried to expose this but because of the way the courts work and the in-camera rules, it is virtually impossible to expose the fact that the Government is letting down these children. I can give one example of where this was exposed. We had a courageous judge, Judge Dermot Simms, who raised his head above the parapet. He wrote a damning letter and gave three reports to the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman. Shockingly, the Minister has confirmed to Aontú that he shredded those reports on the basis of GDPR. Three reports that outlined the horrendous experience of children in State care in this country were written by a judge and given to a Minister. The judge got permission to put the information into those reports from the people concerned and he redacted their names but the Minister for children felt more responsibility for GDPR rules than he did for the protection of those children. That is an absolutely damning indictment of the actions of this Government.

At least 70 unaccompanied minors have gone missing from Tusla since 2017. In the past year, a number of unaccompanied minors, some of whom had come to this country without parents or guardians and who were known to Tusla, have been left homeless in Dublin for weeks. Tusla has been unable to tell me how many children each year are being physically or sexually abused in State care, saying that the data requested is "not centrally collated" by Tusla. The agency is not even collecting the information in relation to abuse that children may suffer in State care. Tusla has also written to tell me that it does not maintain a register of referrals to CORU of allegations against staff members.

Separately, the Department of Justice has told me that records of emails at the blueblindfold@garda.ie address, to which people can make reports of suspected human trafficking, are retained for no longer than 30 days. The emails are deleted after 30 days. This is extremely alarming information. Tusla cannot tell me the number of children who have become pregnant while in State care or the numbers who are referred for sexually transmitted infection testing while in State care on an annual basis. The Government is trying to blame a lack of resources in this regard, while also implying it has something to do with the refugee crisis but this is not true. The problems run deeper and they stretch back for years. The Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, in response to a Dáil question on this topic, was unable to give me clarity on the number of children who go missing from State care. I am not just talking about unaccompanied minors but about the number of children in State care each year who go missing. Imagine, the Minister for children cannot tell this Dáil the number of children who go missing on an annual basis from State care. Where is the child protection instinct of the Government in relation to this?

I have met people from the voluntary sector and the foster care sector who have told me about the significant investment that is needed. They have told me that they are unable to do their job because of the Government's lack of investment. In the month of January alone, 22 children went missing from State care. A 14-year old girl was abducted by a criminal gang within minutes of being placed with Tusla. She was found in a brothel a year later. I would ask the Government, on a day when it is trying to occupy the high moral ground and trying to politically sink the knife into the Opposition, to look at itself and at the hundreds of people who are significantly damaged by the fact that it will not act. This is happening to a group of children because they have no power. They are from poor backgrounds and have nobody with wealth or influence to speak on their behalf. That is why this issue is so much under the table and does not receive priority for discussion in this Chamber. Unfortunately, it is also one of the reasons it is not being fixed. If the Government is real about today, then it must be real about these children too.

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