Any legislation that provides greater supports for children who need them is to be welcomed. However, we also have to make sure that children have, for example, appropriate school settings. There is a report out this week that shows a decrease in the number of young children attending school. If they are not attending school, they come to the attention of Tusla. This week I visited a school in the Minister of State's and my constituency, namely, St. Kevin's Community College on the Fonthill Road. It is my former school. I walked around the school with the principal and there were 32 leaks in the school builsing. It has an autism spectrum disorder, ASD, class that is not fit for purpose. It is meant to moving towards 1,000 pupils but there are no plans for that. As far as I know, the school is not in the summer work programme either, so it will not get any supports during the summer. Schools like St. Kevin's in a disadvantaged areas need to have the appropriate settings to encourage children to go to school, so they do not come to the attention of Tusla. In my previous profession, I supported people suffering with addiction issues. One of the most challenging issues I had was when, within the space of two weeks, three young women presented to our service. All three were products of the care system, all three had addiction issues and all three had a child while in the care of the State. All three had their children taken off them and put into the care of the State while they themselves were in the care of the State. That shows me all that is wrong with Tusla. It is a symptom of a broken care system. These are not isolated incidents. I could bring up more recent incidents in our constituency but I will not because I know there are investigations ongoing. These incidents are not few or far between and they need to be addressed. I hope this Bill goes some way to addressing the problems we are experiencing with Tusla.

Sentiment score: 0.08