Jillian van Turnhout (Independent)
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I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Perry, to the House.

The Reception and Integration Agency, RIA, of the Department of Justice and Equality is responsible for the accommodation of asylum seekers in accordance with the Government policy of direct provision. According to RIA's latest monthly report, that of June 2012, there were 4,900 people in its live system, that is, living in direct provision accommodation centres throughout Ireland. Of this number, 1,723 were children. Of this number, 907 were children between the ages of 17 and five, and 816 were aged four years and younger.

The Minister, Deputy Shatter, is very aware of the Irish Refugee Council?s report entitled, State Sanctioned Child Poverty and Exclusion: The case of children in accommodation for asylum-seekers, published on 18 September last. The report paints a bleak and worrying picture about the treatment and care of children in direct provision accommodation. It documents frequent instances of poverty, malnutrition and dietary related illnesses among young children in Ireland.

The findings of the IRC report are very much in keeping with the concerns raised by the Government's Special Rapporteur on Child Protection, Dr. Geoffrey Shannon, in his 2011 report, in which he highlighting "the specific vulnerability of children accommodated in the ... Direct Provision and the potential or actual harm which is being created by the particular circumstances of their residence including the inability of parents to properly care for and protect their children ...".

Dr. Shannon has also expressed concern about the "real risk" of child abuse in direct provision accommodation where single parent families are required to share with strangers and where families with teenage children of opposite gender are required to share one room. He cited, in support of his concern, the case of a 14 year old girl in a centre in Mayo who became pregnant by a male resident in the same centre in September 2011.

Given the parallels between Dr Shannon and the IRC's respective supports, I was surprised by the tenor of the response on behalf of the Minister to my colleague Senator Ó Clochartaigh?s recent Adjournment motion that the IRC's findings and contentions simply "seems unlikely".

That said, I welcome that the Minister has directed that the report be comprehensively examined and any issues arising be addressed. I welcome in particular his directing that issues relating to child welfare be dealt with without delay. I would be interested to hear from the Minister about the logistics for this comprehensive examination, who will carry it out and when we can expect a report.

What we cannot lose sight of when we are talking about children in direct provision accommodation is the fundamental premise that a child is a child. Irrespective of country of origin and regardless of the application status of the parent or parents, the welfare and protection of children must always be at the forefront of what we do.

It is timely to be debating this Adjournment motion on the same evening as we passed Second Stage of the Thirty-First Amendment of the Constitution (Children) Bill 2012. In recent years the Oireachtas has spent significant time discussing horrific reports about the institutional abuse of children.

To get to the point of my question, what I am genuinely concerned about is that our treatment of children in direct provision accommodation will become our shameful report of the future. Like many others, I am doing my best to ensure this does not happen.

At this juncture, I will limit my questions to the following. Can the Minister confirm the number of children living in direct provision accommodation who have been born in Ireland or born to an Irish parent? Are the HIQA national standards for the protection and welfare of children for Health Service Executive children and family services, published in July 2012, applicable to children in direct provision accommodation?

I understand the RIA's child and family services unit is responsible for the monitoring and implementation of the RIA's child protection policy and does so in close partnership with the HSE child protection and welfare service nationally. I note, in particular, the standards stipulates that "Child protection and welfare services provided on behalf of statutory service providers are monitored for compliance with legislation, regulations, national child protection and welfare policy and standards". Features to meet the requirements of the Standard include:

3.4.1 Formalised agreements are in place for the provision of child protection and welfare services for children and families, which are sourced externally.
3.4.2 Formalised agreements include the scope of service provided, resources required to deliver the service, monitoring and governance arrangements, including compliance with national policy, Children First and relevant standards.
3.4.3 External service providers are monitored on a regular basis to assure the service provided to children and families is compliant with legislation, regulations, these Standards and national policy.

John Perry (Sligo-North Leitrim, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Senator for raising this important issue, to which I am responding on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Alan Shatter.

The Reception and Integration Agency, RIA, of the Department of Justice and Equality is responsible for the accommodation of asylum seekers in accordance with the Government's policy of direct provision and dispersal. Standard 3.4 of HIQA's national standards states as follows:

Child protection and welfare services provided on behalf of statutory service providers are monitored for compliance with legislation, regulations, national child protection and welfare policy and standards.

The RIA and the HSE co-operate closely in meeting the needs of residents, particularly children, in all centres. Discussions take place through inter-agency meetings, health liaison officer meetings, medical screening service meetings, working groups on matters such as healthy infant feeding guidelines, child protection, psychological and other health service groups. The RIA has a child protection policy, based on the HSE's Children First national guidelines for the protection and welfare of children. This policy is being updated in line with the recently revised HSE's Children First policy published in July 2011. All staff working in RIA centres are Garda vetted and trained in the RIA child protection policy. The RIA takes its role regarding the welfare of children and vulnerable adults very seriously. It is satisfied that its child protection policies comply with all national standards and policies.

It is a difficult and complex matter to definitively establish, particularly in the short time involved, the number of Irish citizen children living in the direct provision system. In a recent report by an NGO it was described as a considerable number, but there is no evidence that this is so. In fact, the likelihood is that the cohort involved is extremely small. The number of people being accommodated in the direct provision system is just under 5,000 in 36 centres throughout the State.

The principal difficulty is that it is common for asylum seeker families to have a child born while residing in the direct provision system. In some cases, the parents concerned may have a mistaken belief their child is an Irish citizen by dint of being born here. However, this clearly is not so, as since 1 January 2005 there is no automatic right to Irish citizenship. Some parents in this circumstance do not make an asylum application on behalf of the child and the exact nationality of the child only becomes definitively known when such an application is made, sometimes arising from, for example, a deportation order issuing against the rest of the family or the institution of legal proceedings. From a practical point of view, the RIA must continue to accommodate that child with his or her family, notwithstanding the uncertainty over the child's nationality or asylum status. The Minister has asked his immigration officials to examine this statistical issue in more detail and communicate further with the Senator in the matter.

Jillian van Turnhout (Independent)
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I will pursue this issue. The standards should apply to these centres, as the RIA is a statutory agency. I do not agree with the interpretation put forward, but I will pursue it with the Minister. Equally, when he seeks the numbers of children from me - I note the date of January 2005 - I will point out that, potentially, children over the age of seven years are Irish citizen children but because of the status of their parents are residing in the direct provision system. I encourage colleagues to visit the direct provision centres. We talk about the Ryan report and what society knew what was happening in the past. It is happening in direct provision centres, on which the report in 20 years time will be shocking and damning if we do not do something now. The Minister is a very strong defender of children's rights and child protection, which is why I raise the issue.