The problems of some of the most difficult children in the State have been worsened by the child care system, a new report argues.
It accuses the Department of Health and Children, for which it was written, of failing to develop a national policy for child care, which it describes as "a serious shortcoming".
The Department has refused to release the report to The Irish Times under the Freedom of Information Act on the grounds that it is still in draft form. However, the newspaper has since seen a copy of the report, written by a Scottish consultant, Mr Mike Laxton. One of the main failures of the child care system is the frequency with which unsuitable foster care or residential arrangements break down, according to the report. It is crucial, it says, to minimise the incidence of children moving about within the system.
But attempts to improve matters face a variety of obstacles identified by Mr Laxton.
These include the absence of a national policy, the absence of basic information about children in care and low staff morale in child care.
"Staff morale is low and residential staff are working in high-risk situations where some unit managers believe that their staff's wellbeing is being put in jeopardy on a regular basis," he writes.
Significant new money will have to be put into the development of services over the next six years, he says, but this will be effective only if there is a national plan for child care. "Child care policy and practice can no longer afford to be governed by the last judicial review or child care crisis," it says. "Positive, consistent, planned action is required."
The Department commissioned the report in the light of High Court decisions that health boards are under a constitutional obligation to provide care for children who need to be detained for their own welfare. Mr Laxton was asked to consider what was needed in terms of residential places for children in both "high-support" and secure units.
The report favours residential units giving a high level of support to children for a time, but says that given the present state of the child care system, they will not work.
He says there is a shortage of foster care, ordinary residential units and hostels to which to move children when they no longer need high support. There is also a shortage of child psychiatrists and educational psychologists throughout the State.
The report recommends that:
Health boards should produce three-year plans for the development of child care services under the supervision of the Department of Health and Children.
They should draw up contracts with residential homes and foster parents so that children cannot leave their care until a plan for their future care has been put in place.
A national policy, guidelines and standards for child care should be developed.
Greater co-operation between teachers and social workers should be promoted.
Staff numbers in residential care should be increased.
The allowance of approximately £60 per week paid to foster parents should be increased and professional foster-carers should be recruited on full salary.
The work of the Departments of Health and Children, Education and Science, and Justice, Equality and Law Reform should be co-ordinated.
"The conclusion to be drawn from this review of current policies and practices is that dysfunctional and inadequate families are being cared for by dysfunctional and inadequate services," Mr Laxton writes.
"The stark consequence is that some children being brought into care are being inadequately cared for and in some instances further damaged by the experiences. Many of the children subject to judicial review and/or causing concern to health boards and residential schools have been known to the care services for a long time and their problems have been invariably exacerbated by a series of inappropriate placements."