Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senators for their helpful contributions. It is clear that they have spent some time reading and reflecting deeply on the report and, where the social services provided through Tusla are concerned, have been in touch with colleagues and those who work within their communities. All of them have referred to the commitment of and excellent work being done by the organisation's people on the ground. I acknowledge and express my gratitude for that work. It is a difficult time, given how critical the report has been of many aspects of the organisation. I am at one with Senators in that regard. I am also at one with the board and chief executive who are also in communication with the people concerned and have expressed their willingness to support them in a new way and commit to the sense of urgency for which all of the Senators have called.

I will respond first to the Senators' focus on the people providing the services and what we owe them in difficult work circumstances. All of the Senators referred to the sense of urgency. I have communicated to the chairperson and the chief executive directly that I will also be seeking urgency. HIQA is also seeking it.

The first recommendation is for Tusla to develop an action plan that will respond to all aspects of the report. When I spoke to the chief executive this morning, he stated Tusla was working on it. When I meet the board at the end of this week, we will discuss it further. The chief executive stated it would take a maximum of a couple of weeks to put the plan together. It will not only outline what is to happen but also who will be responsible and what the timelines and deadlines will be. HIQA has asked that Tusla, after it examines the recommendations and develops the action plan in response, revert to it with information on the timelines for the various actions to be taken. I will ask HIQA to advise me on whether it believes the timelines are suitable.

Regarding the recommendation on establishing an oversight or quality assurance group to ensure implementation of the recommendations and action plan, the House will be aware that I appointed the independent Dr. Moling Ryan to chair the group. My officials have already met him and will do so again tomorrow. They are undertaking a process of agreeing the group's membership and terms of reference. Dr. Ryan will probably have read the report thoroughly by tomorrow and will make recommendations on the categories of members to be included - it will not be a large group - and the terms of reference that will be needed if the group is to do its work, which is targeted at the report's recommendations. My understanding is those involved hope to have the process completed and the people gathered to do the work by next month and that the work will start in September. That said, we need to keep an eye on the ongoing timeframe. I will be happy to revert to the House on the matter. I am trying to describe an awareness of the need for timelines, given the sense of urgency involved.

The second question raised by the Senators was related to staffing issues, which were a key aspect of the significant criticisms raised in HIQA's report, as well as its recommendations. Senator Rose Conway-Walsh asked what it was like to be a social worker. Social workers face challenges and difficulties and want more colleagues to share the work. That is a key issue and we will approach it in a number of ways, one of which will be engagement with the higher education sector. This medium to long-term approach is meant to increase the number of professionally qualified social workers on which Tusla can draw. It has been liaising with third level institutions in the Republic, Northern Ireland and Great Britain. There are a limited number of graduates per year. Since they make a significant contribution to Tusla, it is important that it liaise with other jurisdictions also.

The Senators may be interested to know that we have been working with the Department of Health which has the lead role in the national strategic framework for health and social care workforce planning. In addition, my Department has been working with the Department of Health and Tusla in examining the various relevant issues over a period. That said, we need to increase the tempo in that regard. I met the Minister for Education and Skills last week to discuss the issue. We agreed that his officials would work with mine in considering the need for additional social work training places and specific courses within the overall degree programme and in examining other aspects of higher education training for social workers that could not just lead to more workers but also allow us to draw on others' expertise and training. Practical issues such as these will feed into the discussions with officials and the Minister for Education and Skills on the mix of skills, workflows and staff in Tusla recommended in the report. We will work with the third level sector to determine how we can not just train more people but also train more differently.

Senator Lorraine Clifford-Lee asked about training people from different backgrounds. Mature students are welcome to apply for social work training. When I met the chief executive and the chief operations officer this morning, they told me that Tusla offered training bursaries. They want to draw on people from different backgrounds. My officials are engaging with the Department of Education and Skills on the issue of increasing the number of training places.

I wish to address two other aspects of the human resources issue. We need to do something before the medium term hits and more social workers have been attracted into the system. I will appoint an independent human resources expert to Dr. Ryan's group who will work specifically on immediate plans for a different staff mix and workflow in order that social workers will be able to focus more on their social work, as distinct from the other necessary aspects of working with families and children. The other aspect would have to do with the retention of social workers. Obviously, we need to bring them in but we also need to keep them. Senior practice social workers are going to be on every child protection team and senior social workers are going to be deployed to all duty teams. Tusla has a welfare strategy for social workers who experience stress. All of these issues have been identified with regard to the changes that would be required to support the social workers who are there and want to stay because of their great commitment and their sense of vocation for what they are doing, as well as it being a profession.

The Senator also had questions around the relationship between the Garda Síochána and Tusla. The two bodies have developed a draft memorandum of understanding on information and data protection issues, given these have been some of the challenging aspects of working together that have slowed down some of the processes. We now have a draft memorandum of understanding in regard to the way they share their information. My understanding from my officials is that this should finally be agreed within a short period of time, that is, within the next couple of weeks. It has been developed to ensure there is no practical or legislative roadblock that impedes the sharing of child protection information between the Garda and Tusla. Equally, there is no legal barrier to the sharing of that information for child protection purposes, which is very important.

A question was also raised on another aspect, namely, specialist interviewing. The Garda Síochána and Tusla are examining the development of additional specialist training to improve this area and they are working together, especially with regard to gardaí training Tusla staff, in order to identify more people who can do that specialist interviewing with children.

Senator Devine also asked about specialist child protection units, which we have been working on in light of Professor Shannon's report. We are working with the Department of Justice and Equality and the Garda in regard to developing a proposal, and I hope it will be completed to the point where we can, in the fall, identify at least some form of piloting approach to that. While that is all I will say for the moment, there have certainly been many meetings, much thinking and the development of strategies with the Garda, as well as with my own Department.

In addition, to date in 2018 the Garda Síochána has established four divisional protection units - in Cork, Louth, Blanchardstown and Clondalkin. Tusla is working with the Garda Síochána in assigning child protection social workers to work with each unit and a further eight units are expected to be open in the coming months. I have tried to identity some of the key ways in which new actions which have been in the process of being designed are ready to, or are actually beginning to, be delivered, which I think and hope will make a significant difference.

Senator Clifford-Lee asked who is responsible. The questions of oversight and governance are critical, especially in the agency that protects our children. There is a board and there is also a chief executive. The oversight group will oversee and quality assure the implementation of this report, and although it will not oversee the whole thing, it will have some responsibility in terms of oversight in that regard. Ultimately, however, I am responsible. I certainly feel very aware of and committed to assuring the recommendations of this report are implemented with a great sense of urgency. That is why we have already tried to act on some of them. Overall, it is my Ministry. The chief executive also acknowledged at the committee that he too is responsible, given the level he is at within the organisation, and he is taking that very seriously.

It is given those different levels of accountability and oversight, as well as the changes I am indicating and the ways in which we are going to implement the recommendations, that I believe this provides us with the opportunity to move into a new period for Tusla. The HIQA report states that the vision is good and that the strategic policies at national level, which have been developing in recent years, are good and strong, but it is not enough. That is what our work is for the next period of time.