This Bill amends the Child Care Act 1991, which is wide-ranging legislation that seeks to promote the welfare of children who may not receive adequate care and protection. Over the years the Act supported the establishment of Tusla, the Child and Family Agency, and an amendment to Article 42A of the Constitution to recognise the rights of the child. As per the programme for Government, the Act is being updated based on a review identifying what is working well to address gaps and operational improvements. It is absolutely necessary that we modernise this Act, and there has been consultation on this over several years. It should better protect children from harm and improve stability for them by allowing for the updating of care orders and care arrangements and supporting the establishment of an inter-agency committee for better co-operation. It will introduce guiding principles for Tusla to follow in the performance of its duties, including that the best interests of the child are of paramount consideration, ultimately, to ensure children's rights guide decision-making and for a better alignment with the UNCRC. I welcome the rights-based progress and more joined-up thinking. I also welcome putting the national review panel on a statutory footing. It has been raised already but I ask that the Minister engage directly with the guardians ad litem, GALs, particularly in relation to their concerns around independence. They are a very important stakeholder. From engagement with Tusla, it is clear the pressure it is under is immense. Since it was established in 2014, child protection and welfare referrals have more than doubled. For the first 11 months of 2025, the agency received 98,000 referrals, an increase of more than 10% over the previous year. Such is the importance of these services, any gaps must be addressed strategically and proactively. Its presence on the ground in communities has never been more important. While I see areas like ours grow, and it is great we are seeing new communities, I want to see the Tusla network grow in those areas as well. They need to be connected into early intervention. We need the targeted and the specialist services and supports across the State. Tusla advised the committee last week that it had moved from 17 areas to 13 networks, which it says means it has smaller geographical areas. Within each of those areas, it has local integrated teams. These are integrated front-door teams, where it has family support teams and child welfare and protection services integrated under one roof, so when requests come into the service, they can screen them and react quickly. I wonder whether that is enough, and if it is doing enough work to reach into communities. Through the likes of the local community safety partnerships, there should be the opportunity to strengthen the Tusla presence, working closely with youth workers, social workers, the JLOs and local communities. This Bill is the second half of amendments to the Child Care Act 1991. The first half passed in 2024 and was focused on early years services, including the removal of the exemption of regulations on self-employed childminders who work in childminders’ homes. The Minister then followed that up with specific regulations. I take the opportunity to briefly focus on childminding services. There has been very low registration during the three-year transition period to September 2027. Families using childminders are not necessarily able to avail of the national childcare scheme subsidies. Lots of parents out there are worried their childminders are not going to sign up to Tusla. The supply is not there to choose one that is. It is great to see so much focus on childminding in phase 1 of the early years action plan. I think we all agree the regulation of childminding services is critical to the safeguarding of children. Childminders are anxious about how inspections will be carried out on their homes, so I am asking the Minister of State to update us on when the review of the registration process will take place because time really is of the essence. We want to ensure we are not losing childminders from the sector, and we need to support our parents. That is the goal. We need to ensure we are doing both but the safeguarding of children is the most important priority of all. I will also take the opportunity to ask about the 17 crèches that did not register properly and were in danger of not being able to open earlier this month and whether the new Garda vetting process was part of what happened there.

Sentiment score: 0.29