Written answers

Tuesday, 31 March 2015

Department of Children and Youth Affairs

Commissions of Inquiry

Photo of Jonathan O'BrienJonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein)
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433. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs if he will provide details of the resource constraints preventing full implementation of the Ryan report recommendations; and the estimated cost of implementing the recommendations. [12935/15]

Photo of James ReillyJames Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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The Report of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse (The Ryan Report) was published in 2009 and detailed disturbing and significant levels of historic abuse of Irish children who were placed, by the State, in residential institutions run by religious orders. The Government accepted all of the recommendations of the Ryan Report, and in response developed an Implementation Plan. The Implementation Plan set out a series of 99 actions which addressed the recommendations to improve services to children in care, in detention and at risk.

The Government has approved the Fourth and Final Monitoring Report of the Ryan Implementation Group which illustrated that the vast majority of the recommendations (i.e. 94 out of a total of 99), have been implemented or are being implemented on an ongoing basis. It should also be noted that the Monitoring Group, which authored the Report, welcomed the significant positive developments that have taken place over the lifetime of the Implementation Plan.

As regards the cost of implementation, additional funding of €24m has been provided to implement the Plan. €15m was provided in 2010, the majority of which was allocated to the Health Service Executive to progress various actions, in particular the recruitment of additional social work staff. Funding was also provided to the Health Information and Quality Authority to allow for the commencement of work on standards and inspections of child protection services. This allocation of €15m remains in the allocations of the relevant agencies in the current year. A further allocation of €9m was also made on a once off basis in 2011 to provide for implementation of actions.

I share the concern of the monitoring group that five of the actions are incomplete. These incomplete actions are in relation to the erection of a memorial to the survivors of institutional abuse; a longitudinal study of children in care; the maintenance of records of children in care and the development of an archive for same, and research into best practice in family law court processes. As the Government has committed to the full implementation of all 99 of the Implementation Plan actions, I will continue to liaise with relevant Government colleagues and the Child and Family Agency as regards implementation and I have also undertaken to keep the Government informed of progress until full implementation is achieved.

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