I welcome the report of the Ombudsman for Children’s Office (OCO) “Safety and Welfare of Children in Direct Provision” and my Department accepts its recommendations in full.
I am pleased that the recommendations of Dr Muldoon's Office are being acted on by all of the relevant agencies. While a good deal of work has been undertaken in the past number of years to improve the services provided to children and their families, IPAS, Tusla and the HSE have committed to increased collaboration and coordination in the coming period.
As the Deputy may be aware a new Vulnerability Assessment process is currently being piloted by the IPAS. The pilot commenced in December 2020 and was extended to all new applicants for International Protection from the beginning of February. The purpose of these assessments is to determine if an applicant is deemed to have special reception needs, what those needs are and what actions are required to address those needs. Assessment questions are based on the various categories of vulnerability identified within the EU Reception Conditions Directive 2013/33/EU, and have been refined within the Irish context with the help of the HSE.
A new Resident Welfare Team has been established within IPAS to case-manage individual families, and single residents, identified as having special reception needs and to ensure that those needs continue to be identified and addressed in the most appropriate way possible. The Resident Welfare Team will be a multi-disciplinary team with experts from the fields of education, health and childcare seconded.
IPAS is also committed to working with Tusla during 2021 to develop interagency protocols and operating procedures that will support the sharing of case information between Tusla and IPAS and to track and monitor referrals and cases from beginning to end.
All existing centres and all new centres are required to develop a child safeguarding statement. IPAS will work with Tusla to ensure compliance with child safeguarding statements and Children First legislation is audited this year. IPAS will be ensuring that child safeguarding statements are translated and made available to all residents. Additional child safety training will also be rolled out to all centre managers as COVID restrictions allow.
Since the recent publication of the OCO report, Tusla has committed to publishing its Direct Provision Policy, 2021, for all staff working with children and families living in Direct Provision accommodation. The policy states that each Direct Provision accommodation centre will have a named point of contact within the relevant Tusla area. The policy also clarifies the ongoing role of the Children and Young Persons Services Committees (CYPSCs) in co-ordinating services and ensuring that children in Direct Provision are included in these services.
In addition, Tusla is reviewing its IT system to plan for the next stage of the development of the National Child Care Information System (NCCIS) and consideration will be given to enable referrals for children living in IPAS accommodation, along with other specified groups of children, to be tracked on a national basis.
As part of the white paper, the Department of Health and the HSE have proposed an enhanced model of health care for international protection applicants. It responds to the main issues facing this population group, covering public health, mental health and physical health. The model is in line with the HSE intercultural health strategy and the Sláintecare reform programme.
The HSE’s approach to intercultural health as outlined in the ‘Second National Intercultural Health Strategy 2018- 2023’ is to support the diverse ethnic and cultural groups in obtaining equal access and opportunities across the Irish health care services. The HSE recognise that a coordinated approach is important in the planning of new accommodation centres and agree that health services need to be involved at an early stage to assess local capacity to meet increased demand. Existing primary care services must be supported when new centres are opened.
In addition, the Department of Health has indicated its committment to work with the HSE to meet the health needs of people seeking international protection in direct provision centres, in collaboration with IPAS and other service providers.
