Tommy Broughan (Dublin Bay North, Independent)
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48. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the measures she is taking to address the recruitment and retention issues in Tusla in cases in which qualified staff are taking agency roles in place of taking full-time contracts with Tusla; the number of unfilled vacant posts; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [6783/19]

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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I strongly support Tusla’s important work. I have secured an additional €110m for the Agency since becoming Minister with the intention of securing permanent staff resources.

I am aware that Tusla has been unable to meet its additional whole time equivalent target each year since its establishment in 2014. The failure to meet its targets include the reality that there is a limited supply of social workers in Ireland and this has contributed to making the achievement of these targets very challenging.

With regard to the number of vacant posts, Tusla has informed me that 320 posts are currently accepted by candidates and a further 569 approved permanent and temporary posts are at various stages of the recruitment process in various grade categories. In this context and to ensure continuity of service, Tusla uses agency staff. I understand at end December 2018, Tusla had 499 agency staff and 226 of these were social workers.

I remain very concerned by the growth in expenditure on temporary agency staff in recent years and I have communicated this to Tusla. Notwithstanding this, given the front line nature of Tusla’s services, it is accepted that agency staff will always be required.

In a sense the need may have grown somewhat in recent years with the significant increase in referrals, new legislation with regard to mandatory reporting and the development of new services.

Tusla has advised that all agency staff are actively encouraged to apply for Tusla’s rolling campaigns for temporary and permanent positions across all grades. However, it must be acknowledged that some individuals prefer the flexibility of agency work.

Recruitment and retention of social workers and residential social care workers for special care are two of the biggest challenges for Tusla.

There are only 200-250 social work graduates each year. It is a very competitive labour market with a variety of services recruiting such as geriatric services, disability, mental health and of course child and family services. While there are many more social care graduates each year it is a small cohort that is willing to work in the particularly challenging environment of special care.

In this context, Tusla continues to take a proactive approach to recruitment with the use of bespoke campaigns, visiting campuses in Ireland and abroad, personally engaging with students registering their interest in Tusla, assisting applicants with CORU registration and running rolling recruitment campaigns.

With regard to the supply of social workers, Tusla recently participated in a meeting hosted by my Department with key social work education stakeholders to influence the future supply of key personnel such as social workers. The first area to be examined will be social work student placements with a view to supporting the provision of more training places.

Furthermore, Tusla has also focussed on recruiting supporting grades such as clerical administration staff to ensure social workers can focus on their core tasks. I understand Tusla’s forthcoming Multi-annual Strategic Workforce Plan will build on this further over the coming years. The Plan will identify the future composition of Tusla’s workforce and I expect this plan will provide the basis for the establishment of achievable recruitment targets once it has been piloted in one or two service areas.

In December 2018, Tusla employee turnover for all grades was 5.07% versus 6.68% for the same period in 2017. This reflects the recent work Tusla has undertaken to address retention issues. It is expected that a robust retention strategy will also form a pillar of the forthcoming workforce plan’s implementation to reduce the turnover rate further and ensure better outcomes for Tusla’s total whole time equivalent staff.