Archdiocese appoints replacement director to child protection service

DUBLIN’S CATHOLIC archdiocese has appointed a diocesan director to its safeguarding and child protection service.

Andrew Fagan replaces Phil Garland, who had been director of child protection in the archdiocese since the service was set up in 2003. Last November, Mr Garland was appointed the HSE’s assistant national director for children and family services.

Mr Fagan is from Naas, Co Kildare and trained as a social worker in Queen’s University Belfast and did postgraduate training in child protection at TCD.

Since then he has worked with State child protection services in the Republic and in Northern Ireland and has managed residential services for children.

In 2000, he was appointed to the Social Services Inspectorate within the Department of Health, where he was responsible for carrying out inspections of State residential and foster care services and with developing better practice and policies for the safety and welfare of children in care.

In 2007, he transferred with the Social Services Inspectorate to the new Health Information and Quality Authority, taking on new responsibilities in relation to services for older people and people with disabilities.

More recently, he led the development of a new set of standards for residential and foster care services for children.

In the archdiocese, Mr Fagan takes over a service which is responsible for the ongoing training of over 2,000 parish volunteers and diocesan personnel who have participated in the Keeping Safe Programme.