Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 22 Apr 1997

Vol. 478 No. 1

Adjournment Debate. - Youth Homelessness.

Mr. Flood

I thank the Chair for giving me the opportunity to raise this important matter and the Minister of State at the Department of Health, Deputy O'Shea, for coming here to deal with the issue.

I am very angry at having to raise the very serious matter of youth homelessness tonight. I have been involved in trying to resolve the issue of three boys in Clondalkin, the subject matter of this debate. These boys have had very poor care in terms of counselling and little or no accommodation or emergency accommodation. It is because I have exhausted all possible avenues open to me to deal with this matter at a local level in Clondalkin and through the Eastern Health Board that I felt compelled, because of the seriousness of the situation, to raise it in the House.

There are two different families involved. Two of the boys are members of one family and the third boy belongs to a different family and is unconnected. Five years ago one of the families found itself in serious difficulty and suffered a serious break-up with the result that an 18 year-old daughter felt compelled to move out of home. She was accommodated by the local authority in an alternative house in her own right. Having achieved that, she took a number of her siblings with her to care for them. It must be remembered that this was an 18 year-old girl taking on the responsibility of caring for a number of her siblings in very difficult and distressing circumstances.

Over the past five years she has done a tremendous job on this task with the benefit of support from a number of mothers in the area who were sympathetic to her case and who have consistently helped her over those five years to cope with the situation in which she found herself. Through time some of the boys for whom she was caring needed specialist care. However, child care services in this area of Clondalkin, for which the Eastern Health Board is responsible, are not adequate to deal with such a crisis. I have found, for example, that these two boys needed counselling and assistance and this was not properly and freely available to them as they required it. They also required residential accommodation when they were unable to remain in the house to which I referred, and that was not available to them either. They were unable to gain access to the services which should be available to them under the Child Care Act.

We have heard from the Minister of State, Deputy Currie, on the amount of resources he has managed to invest in the child care area. If that is the case, it has not made a whit of difference in the Clondalkin area because nothing has improved. In the Clondalkin area in which there are serious problems, the delivery of child care services has deteriorated and when problems are brought to the attention of the most senior officials involved in child care in the Eastern Health Board responses are not forthcoming.

The third boy in question is aged 16. He has also been out of home for the past few weeks and is essentially gravitating towards the city centre. No proper residential accommodation is accessible to him and no counselling of any kind except in a haphazard way. He is being told by health board officials that in order to get accommodation he must go, night after night, to the out of hours service, an emergency service for young people finding themselves suddenly out of home with no proper accommodation. This service was never intended to be used or abused in this way, blocking up the system for other young people who find themselves out of home in a crisis.

If what the Minister reads to the House tonight is different from my version, I will not accept it as being accurate. I ask the Minister of State to investigate these three cases and report back to me.

Minister of State at the Department of Health (Mr. O'Shea)

I wish to thank the Deputy for raising this matter. I will attempt to deal with the issues as best I can.

It is important to state at the outset that due to the current dispute involving paramedical grades in the health services — which include social workers — the information available to my Department is more limited than would normally be the case. I would also like to clarify that issues such as these are primarily a matter for the local health board, in this case the Eastern Health Board.

Subject to these reservations, the position in so far as the Department of Health is aware is that two of the children involved from the first family were made the subject of a Fit Persons Order in 1992. One was placed in residential care and the other went to live with a relative following short-term foster placements. Initially both placements were satisfactory but subsequently problems emerged with both children running away. Recently, both children were living with relatives and social workers have been in touch with them. Social workers have been told by both boys that they are happy with these arrangements.

The second case concerns a 16 year old boy who has had difficulties at home and is now out of home. He was placed by the Eastern Health Board in an emergency hostel and arrangements are being put in place to attempt to deal with some needs which have been identified.

I stress that this may not be the most up-to-date position, and my colleague, Deputy Currie, the Minister of State at the Department of Health with special responsibility for child care, will contact Deputy Flood further if it emerges that the situation has changed significantly.

The Deputy will recall that the Minister of State, Deputy Currie, recently outlined the general position in regard to homelessness in response to a Dáil question tabled by him on 25 March 1997. Overall, since 1993, the Government has approved the development and expansion of child care and family support services, including the further expansion of services and facilities for the young homeless at a cost to date of £40 million on an annualised basis.

The extent and nature of the problems of homeless children varies between health boards and between community care areas. Health boards have taken a series of initiatives to address the problem locally with due regard to the particular nature of the problem in their areas. These include the provision of emergency short-term places, emergency carer's projects, day projects for children who would otherwise be roaming the streets, supported lodgings, supervised accommodation and social work services. In addition, the Eastern Health Board is recruiting foster parents to care specifically for homeless children. Each board has arrangements in place to facilitate access to its services by out of home children in emergency situations, and the Eastern Health Board has been particularly active in this area.