Last night, “RTÉ Investigates” broadcast a shocking report on Tusla and children in State care. This is something we in Aontú have been raising solidly for the past five years. The report was obscene. Young children are being taken from very difficult backgrounds from their parents and being placed into special emergency arrangements. These are often unregulated, often with staff who are unvetted and some of those staff do not even have references. Children are being located in apartments and hotel rooms and are being moved around on a regular basis. In short spaces of time, a child could be in 20 separate locations. Children are sleeping in car parks and sleeping in broken-down cars. They are being groomed by crack cocaine dealers. Children are being sexually abused while in the care of Tusla. Children are being raped in the care of Tusla and known to Tusla. This was reported last night. We have uncovered a harrowing case of a 14-year-old girl who went missing from Tusla just 24 hours after she was placed there. The child was missing for an entire year. She was then found in a brothel. She was a victim of unimaginable exploitation when she was supposedly in the Government’s protection. The Minister has refused in a follow-up question by ourselves to answer if anyone has ever been prosecuted for the trafficking and exploitation of that child. Children are being killed in the care of Tusla and known to Tusla. Two hundred and thirty-five children known to child protection services have been killed in the last 12 years. There have been 13 homicides, 38 deaths as a result of suicide, and, in another parliamentary question from us, we learned that eight children were killed so far this year who were known to Tusla or in the care of Tusla. Mr. Justice John Jordan said that some of these failures are outrageous and an affront to the rule of law. He warned that Tusla is extraordinarily exposed to significant future compensation claims as a result of the harm that is being done to these children. Judge John Campbell stated that he was incandescent with rage that a secure bed could not be found for a child deemed at risk of death. He noted that children who should be getting ready for Santa Claus were being placed in unregulated placements. Judge Simms provided three important documents to the last Minister for children, Roderic O'Gorman, which were shredded. I believe this is one of the most disgusting, shocking scandals that has happened to children in the history of this State. When I first raised this in the Dáil four or five years ago, it was so horrendous that I was sure that the Government would put an end to these special emergency arrangements. It has not. It is actually getting worse. Will the Tánaiste give a commitment today and a date for when the Government will end the special emergency arrangements in this country?

Sentiment score: -0.24

The Tánaiste has not given a date or a commitment that these will be closed completely. The "RTÉ Investigates" programme was of great value but there was one problem with it. The Minister for children was invisible in that show. Tusla is not operating in a vacuum. Tusla is a product of the Tánaiste's Government. It is a responsibility of the Government's Minister. The lack of funds and the lack of social workers is a policy choice by the Government. This scandal is unfolding in Tusla. It ranks up there with many of the scandals in the past but the difference is that this is unfolding in real time for the Government, and Tusla cannot be used as some kind of insulation blanket to separate the Tánaiste's Government from the responsibility for this horror. The Tánaiste said once that he wanted this country to be the best country in the world to be a child. For many of these children, with these horrors, it is one of the worst countries in the world to be a child at the moment. Children are being killed, raped and groomed at a cost of €14,000 a week to the State. When will there be accountability? When will the resources be matched to the needs? Will the Tánaiste give a date and a commitment that by the end of this year, these SEAs will be closed?

Sentiment score: -0.15

It is a sanitised response.

Sentiment score: 0.00

No date, Tánaiste.

Sentiment score: -0.30