Beimid ag tacú leis an mBille cé go mbeimid ag iarraidh roinnt leasuithe a dhéanamh chuige. Anything that improves the functioning of our care system is to be welcomed, although it is very likely we will table amendments. I echo the call made by Deputy Kerrane on engaging with guardians ad litem and their representative organisation. They do a crucial job. A decade ago we had a referendum the purpose of which was to put the child's voice at the heart of things. The guardian ad litem is central to that. I echo the point made on Tusla and the confidence in it that has been lost. There are some really committed social workers out there. I would not want their job for the world. It is incredibly challenging. People are exposed to huge amounts of trauma, challenging circumstances and significant workloads. Unfortunately, at an organisational level, too many children have been failed - failed catastrophically, in many instances. There is a lack of confidence. That needs to be rebuilt. Some of that, I hope, is in terms of the procedure here. Some of it is organisational and some of it is culture. A lot of these children are some of the most vulnerable in our society. An optimistic view of it is that if we can get this whole area right, the impact it will have on our wider society is enormous. Unfortunately, the sad reality at the minute is that children or adults who have been in care are far more likely to need additional educational support, special educational support, mental health supports and to have needs potentially into the criminal justice system. Those children are born the same as any other child but unfortunately the reality is that too often they do not get the support they need. However, if we can get it right in terms of giving them the support they need, the impacts right across all those sectors could be enormous. It is all about early intervention. I will make two final points in relation to this. First, we still seem to have a significant issue with unallocated cases. Too many children who are at risk or who have experienced very difficult circumstances do not have a social worker allocated to their case; certainly no one who can give it the time it requires. That urgently needs to be addressed. The second point is in relation to the office of the Ombudsman for Children and ensuring its eyes can reach everywhere - every location and every centre - a child needs it to reach. That includes IPAS centres and other emergency forms of accommodation. This point was in our proposals in relation to immigration. The system needs to work and decisions need to be made efficiently but we have to make sure every person has decent, humane conditions and that includes children in particular.

Sentiment score: 0.09