Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for addressing us today. This recently-published audit reveals a shocking lack of consistency and resourcing in how we treat our most vulnerable children. It demonstrates very poor level of co-operation between the agencies of the State. It reveals several cases where children were placed back into extremely abusive and dangerous situations because of poor co-operation between State agencies. The audit covers the use of section 12 of the Child Care Act, which refers to An Garda Síochána. It provides for a Garda member to remove a child from the care of his or her family or persons acting, in a case where the Garda member believes there is an immediate or serious risk to the child. I feel that this is very serious. I acknowledge the Minister has spoken of addressing different issues, but after the "Claire Byrne Live" programme, everybody was heartbroken. It is very emotional to even talk about it today in the Seanad. The audit found that gardaí are often forced to repeatedly use the provision in section 12 with very little or no existing support from Tusla or other State agencies.

In 2012 Ireland voted to place the rights of the child on a constitutional footing but this audit demonstrates how little the Government is doing to actually deliver these rights. Clearly, all State agencies should work together to ensure that vulnerable children are protected. The Minister announced recently that a Tusla official should be co-located in the national Garda unit within the next week or so. I seek clarification on that. A measure such as this is akin to putting a sticking plaster on the situation and surely there are other measures we can take. Our children are our future and it is not enough to just open the lines of communication between the Garda and Tusla, we must learn from the harrowing lessons of the past.

In the report on "Claire Byrne Live", we saw that children were removed from their families by gardaí on numerous occasions. They were returned back to the families within 48 hours, yet no risk assessments were done. This is unacceptable. How can a child go back in to the same family within 48 hours with no risk assessment? Tusla was established in 2014. It was obvious that a huge amount of work needed to be done to improve our child protection systems. According to the report on "Claire Byrne Live", gardaí have removed two children per day in such situations, which is 680 children per year, under the section 12 provision. It is unacceptable.

After the report on the "Claire Byrne Live" programme, I wish to highlight the need for more investigations into the current child protection systems in Ireland to look at where the failings are today and what are the barriers to effective protection for these children. I know the Minister's announcement is only the start but Senators need to be part of the solution. We need to find it, we need to be brave and we need to ask the hard questions. The most vulnerable people are our children and we must make sure that we give them the proper upbringing and service and help with their need for a family for which they cry out but are not getting at present. The Minister will address all these issues for me and I thank her again for coming in to the House today.