International Protection Bill 2026: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages
Dail Éireann — 2026-02-25
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Matt Carthy (SF), Cavan-Monaghan

Section 15 concerns Eurodac. It is the first section to deal with the Child and Family Agency, Tusla. The Minister of State will know that we have a number of amendments in respect of the ability of Tusla to do the job it is asked to do. Last week or the week before, Judge Conor Fottrell of the Dublin District Court hit out at what he called profiteering by private operators that are providing unregulated placements for the most vulnerable children, describing it as "wrong and shameful". At the time, he was dealing with a 13-year-old boy who remains missing from an unregulated placement.
This legislation is putting additional responsibilities onto Tusla. Last week, I asked the Minister of State, on a number of occasions, what additional resources Tusla would be provided with. What additional staff will be put in place? How can we have any confidence whatsoever in respect of this legislation that Tusla, a body that many people argue is unfit to do the roles already assigned to it, can do this? A recent report in thejournal.ie stated that a quarter of staff working in special emergency arrangements last year did not have the required documentation to work with vulnerable children. We know that Tusla has referred five emergency childcare providers to the Garda over vetting concerns. These concerns keep coming up. Stories in respect of children in accommodation who are unaccompanied minors in respect of international protection keep coming up, yet we are expected to pass this section and endorse legislation that is adding a substantial amount of workload.
As I said last week, the pre-legislative scrutiny report was very critical of the capacity of Tusla to deal with the additional workload that will be put on it, yet the Minister of State has not had any answers to any of the questions he has been asked in respect of the capacity of Tusla. In fact, last week, he said he could not answer about Tusla as it is under another Department, but he is happy enough to introduce legislation that is putting responsibilities and will inevitably put an increased workload on Tusla. Will the Minister of State give assurances to the House this week that he was not able to provide last week?

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Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:41+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-02-25