Barry Andrews (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

I thank Senators for their reasoned contributions. Clearly, they have engaged directly with the Ombudsman for Children's report and the two hours have passed quickly. It has been a very interesting debate.

Senator Twomey has suggested I show support for social workers in view of the difficulty of the work they do. Last year I had four regional meetings with social workers, something that had never been done previously by a Minister and for which I did not seek press coverage. I did it because I recognised the points made by Senator Twomey and those made earlier by Senator O'Malley about the difficult work done by social workers, issues of morale within the service, the need to show leadership and the sharing of risk as a society. We try to drive that message in the reform process in which we are engaged.

Senator McFadden spoke about after-care services. That is a matter for a separate debate. We debated it when we discussed the Child Care (Amendment) Bill and I have made my commitment clear.

The issue of holding a referendum has been raised, but it is not really relevant to this discussion. However, to clarify, the referendum proposal made by the committee is not solely about child protection; it also relates to every aspect of the life of a child in Ireland, be it education, care in the health service, immigration, adoption or family law. All of these matters are covered by the proposal and we must bear this in mind. That is the reason it is taking a long time for it to be considered by various Departments.

Senator O'Malley spoke about the conflict between the justice and health elements. That is true, but there is an attempt to address the issue in the Child Care (Amendment) Bill. It provides that if a special care case is before the courts, it does not necessarily mean it must be withdrawn from HSE consideration, that a special care order can continue to be pursued up to and including a sentence short of actual detention. I hope that tension will be removed. The HSE should not try to walk away from cases just because a criminal charge might be involved. It is not the policy I would consider appropriate, as I have indicated to the HSE previously.

Several Senators raised the issue of the child protection notification system identified in the Ombudsman for Children's report. There was confusion about whether it should be accessible 24 hours a day, seven days a week, whether it should be just for ongoing child protection concerns or whether a closed case should also be contained within it. There were also questions as to whether it should be accessible by people who were not social workers and not involved in the child protection system. The HSE has included in its national child care information system a proposal to ensure all these areas will be covered. The only issue that has not been settled is whether it should deal simply with ongoing cases or historical cases. I am having that discussion with the HSE.

Senator Cannon started the debate and made a political point that we could legislate for the bank guarantee in a rapid manner but not for the holding of a referendum or to put the Children First guidelines on a statutory basis. We made a commitment in the Ryan report implementation plan to deal with the Children First guidelines by the end of this year and we are committed to honouring it. The referendum proposal emerged from the committee three months ago. People have been calling for a referendum for almost 20 years, initially in 1993, then in the Constitution Review Group in 1996 and many times subsequently. We have had the referendum proposal for three months and must give it due consideration. I agree that we must remove it from the discussion about by-elections, deal with it on its merits and hold it, when appropriate. We must get it right rather than do it in a rushed way for motives that are outside children's interests.

Senator Butler paid tribute to foster carers. As many have pointed out, they are ordinary people doing extraordinary work.

Senator Mullen expressed sympathy for me, given the brief I hold. It will be no surprise that I consider it a huge privilege at this very difficult time. He took issue with the point about Dr. Brady. Both he and the church generally have to deal with a generalised institutional cover-up that happened over many years. I am not talking about Dr. Brady specifically, but it is an issue, of which everybody is aware and which emerged in the Murphy report. The allegations arose at a time prior to the issuing of the Children First guidelines. They are judged against the church's own standards and the law that applied at the time. The Senator said it was hypocritical to call for Dr. Brady to resign from his position as primate while advocating compliance with the Children First guidelines. This is illogical. The Government has made no statement about Dr. Brady or his position. Today there is no doubt that a failure to report a concern about child abuse would be in breach of the Children First guidelines and that if anybody were to fail to report such abuse, there would be no hesitation in condemning such inaction. There is nothing contradictory in this.

The issue of mandatory reporting was raised by a number of Senators. Not only has Mr. Geoffrey Shannon said in his special rapporteur's recommendation that this is not a policy we should pursue, but Dr. Helen Buckley also said it in an academic paper I read six months ago. Reviews of international literature show that in jurisdictions where there is mandatory reporting, it simply overloads the child protection system. As I said in my opening remarks, it does not lead to an increase in the number of substantiated claims. These are the facts. According to practitioners in these other jurisdictions - Senator Healy Eames did some training overseas - it is a case of trying to put the genie back in the bottle. One cannot do it. We recommended that the Children First guidelines be placed on a statutory footing. That was welcomed by the NGO community and those working with children as the right way to proceed. However, as Senator Alex White said, it is not enough to place them on a statutory footing. We must also put the implementation framework in place. The Senator was concerned about when that would happen. I indicated that I would bring recommendations to the Government and that will be done in the next few weeks. I do not wish to pin it down further and give a hostage to fortune, but it is imminent. There has been much progress and a great deal of work done in recent weeks.

With regard to the national vetting bureau Bill which also emerged from the Oireachtas committee of which Senator White was a member, work on it is being done as a priority. The heads of the Bill are in preparation. The matter was complicated because the sharing of information across agencies was not simple and, initially, the view was that it would require a constitutional referendum. Including the safeguards recommended by the Attorney General requires complicated legislation. Where the bureau would be managed was another issue. It will be managed by the Garda vetting bureau and will have a similar sharing of expertise as the Criminal Assets Bureau. It will include the various sectors in one office which will have responsibility for driving this issue. However, it will require a significant increase in resources for the Garda vetting bureau. Hundreds of extra staff will be required to cope with the obvious increase in workload that will result.

Many Senators mentioned the tragic case of Daniel McAnaspie. I add my expression of sympathy to his family and friends on the tragic circumstances that led to his death. Every care is taken with children in the care of the State. However, as the Ombudsman for Children says in her report, it is impossible to protect all children from harm at all times. The circumstances in which children come into the care of the State are usually very difficult. Sometimes it is presented in a facile way that the HSE has harmed children who otherwise present without problems. Invariably, where a care order is sought, every other intervention has failed. This view was repeated yesterday morning on RTE radio by Mary Ellen Ring who said that in much the same way that no parent could guarantee the safety of his or her child, neither could the State give such assurances. That is not to say, however, that we are diluting our responsibilities or seeking absolution for failures identified by the Ombudsman for Children in her report.

I welcome the report, even though it makes criticisms. However, we made the same criticisms in our review in 2008. We acknowledge them.

If we did not recognise the deficits in the system, we would not be embarked on a path of reform as detailed as we are.

I undertook to explain to Senator Alex White the position on social workers. The HSE service plan for 2010 undertakes to recruit an additional 200 social workers for child protection services: 50 by the end of the second quarter, a further 75 by the end of the third quarter and the final 75 in the fourth quarter. The HSE states that the first candidates have been interviewed and by the end of June, it expects to have an additional 50 social workers recruited. When I say "additional", I mean additional to the beginning number and not simply the replacement of staff who are leaving, on leave or anything like that. I also note that the HSE, as recently as the last week in April, placed further recruitment advertisements in national newspapers with a salary scale from €43,000 to €56,000 per annum. I am informed that the response to this particular advertisement was very positive.

Senator Healy Eames asked if I was not engaging with the HSE appropriately. I have met with the leadership of the HSE in the child protection area every month since my appointment as Minister of State to drive the very issues that have been raised in this House.

Senator Corrigan raised the question of whether an Oireachtas joint committee on the protection of children and vulnerable adults should be set up. It is something to which we should give consideration.

There are many other issues I would have liked to have reached but I hope I have addressed as many as possible in the short timeframe.