Ruairí Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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103. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth to provide an update on the development of protocols for the safeguarding of children and vulnerable people; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [20931/25]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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There are robust legislative, policy and practice measures in place to promote the safeguarding of children in Ireland.

The Children First Act 2015 provides for number of key child protection measures. Under the Act, mandated persons, who are professionals working with children across a wide range of sectors including education, health, justice, youth and childcare, are legally required to report child protection concerns above a defined threshold to Tusla. The Act also requires that all organisations providing services to children must ensure, as far as practicable, that children are safe from harm while availing of their service. They are obliged to carry out a risk assessment and publish a Child Safeguarding Statement setting out the principles and procedures that they have in place to safeguard children. The Act operates side-by-side with the non-statutory obligations provided for in Children First: National Guidance for the Protection and Welfare of Children 2017.

Child protection is everyone's responsibility and it is a key objective of Children First to raise awareness of our shared obligations to safeguard children. Later this year, I will launch the third Children First Awareness Week, in partnership with Tusla and with Departments and agencies across Government.

Tusla has extensive powers under the Child Care Act, 1991 and the Child and Family Agency Act, 2013 to take appropriate action to promote the welfare of any child who is not receiving adequate care and protection. Tusla's child protection services are, in turn, governed by legal mechanisms and published standards, and are subject to independent inspection by HIQA. These inspections ensure that Tusla-operated services meet appropriate standards. Where they don’t, identified issues must be addressed and improvements made.

Safeguarding vulnerable adults against abuse is also of paramount importance and is taken very seriously by the Government. The current Programme for Government includes a commitment to publish a national policy on adult safeguarding for the health and social care sector. This is currently being developed by the Department of Health and it will cover the full spectrum of healthcare and social care services, public, private and voluntary.