Structural Reform of Child Welfare Governance: Motion [Private Members]
Dail Éireann — 2026-03-19
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Ken O'Flynn (II), Cork North-Central

I move:
That Dáil Éireann:
notes that:
— child protection and welfare represent one of the most fundamental constitutional obligations of the State;
— Tusla, the Child and Family Agency, operates as a statutory agency at arm's length from direct departmental control, funded by the Exchequer, but structurally separate from the Department of Children, Disability and Equality;
— this governance model has resulted in:
— blurred lines of accountability between the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality, and Tusla;
— delays in political responsiveness; and
— ongoing difficulty for elected representatives seeking urgent intervention in serious child welfare matters;
— over the past decade, repeated reviews and audits have highlighted:
— delays in child protection assessments;
— social worker recruitment and retention challenges;
— a backlog in referrals; and
— inconsistent case management standards;
— Tusla's Annual Report and Financial Statements 2024, confirms that:
— 451 organisations were funded under Section 56 arrangements;
— 121 additional organisations were funded through the Education Support Service; and
— a total of approximately 572 external organisations received funding in 2024;
— the scale and fragmentation of these funding arrangements raises legitimate questions regarding:
— administrative overheads;
— governance duplication;
— financial transparency; and
— strategic coherence; and
— in a number of comparable jurisdictions, child protection functions are directly embedded within Ministerial Departments, ensuring clearer democratic accountability;
acknowledges that:
— frontline social workers, and child protection professionals, perform critical and demanding work under significant pressure;
— any reform must protect service continuity and safeguard vulnerable children; and
— structural reform must be carefully phased, and evidence based; and
calls on the Government to:
— commission an independent governance review, examining the feasibility of dissolving Tusla as a separate legal entity, and transferring its statutory powers directly to the Minister for Children, Disability and Equality;
— publish, within 12 months, a White Paper outlining options to:
— establish a child protection directorate within the Department of Children, Disability and Equality;
— consolidate policy and operational authority;
— streamline funding and procurement structures;
— enhance direct Ministerial accountability;
— develop a phased transition plan, if recommended, over a 12 to 24-month period, to ensure uninterrupted service delivery; and
— strengthen financial oversight mechanisms, including unified budgeting and improved reporting transparency to the Oireachtas; and
— establish or reinforce an independent statutory inspectorate to ensure robust oversight under any revised governance model.
I thank the people in my office who helped me to prepare this motion, including Mr. Ciarán Kenneally, Ms Eileen Kelly McCarthy and Mr. Max Keating, as well as Mr. Mark Nolan of Independent Ireland. They put in tremendous background work.
The protection of children is one of the most fundamental responsibilities of any state. When a state intervenes in the life of a child, removes a child from danger or assumes the responsibility for a child's welfare, that state becomes the child's protector. That responsibility is not theoretical or administrative. It is, quite simply, moral. When a state assumes that responsibility, it must do so through a system that is clear, accountable, credible and capable of acting decisively when the child's safety is at risk. That is why the motion before the House today is so important. Child protection services are, of course, necessary. The question is whether the system through which we deliver those services is as functional and effective as it must be.
Tusla was established in 2014 with the well-being of children as its objective. The State sought to create a specialised agency dedicated entirely to child protection and supporting the family. It was intended to bring together the services that had previously been framed and fragmented across different parts of the public system. That was the hope and the dedication of the agency at the time. It would provide focused professional expertise and improved outcomes for vulnerable children. That ambition was right. However, more than a decade after its establishment and considering the experiences we have had in this country, we must ask ourselves a very simple question. Has the structure we created, and its associated level of accountability and effectiveness in protecting children, truly worked?
In addressing that question directly, it is important to acknowledge the extraordinary work of the carers and others who carry out the day-to-day work within the system. Social workers, family support services, foster carers, residential care staff and many others across the country perform one of the most difficult roles in the public service. They work with children who have experienced neglect, trauma and, in some cases, instability. They work with families in crisis and make complex decisions every day in circumstances that require judgment, compassion and professionalism. Their commitment deserves recognition from this House.
However, those who are on the front line of those particular professional services deserve something else. They deserve, above all, a system that functions properly. They deserve leadership that is clear, governance that is coherent and accountability that is real. When the system begins to struggle, it is those exact front-line staff who are left carrying the heavy burden. That is neither fair to, nor safe for, the children they are trying to protect.
Over the past number of years, we have heard repeated warnings about the conditions of the child protection system. Those warnings have come from regulators, the courts and by way of independent reports and inspections. HIQA inspections have repeatedly identified serious deficiencies in some areas of child protection services. They have highlighted delays in assessing risk to children, identified failures in case management and pointed to shortcomings in safety and safety planning. Certain inspections found there was non-compliance by some services with protection standards for children. These are not minor administrative oversights. They are issues that strike directly at the heart of the efficiency of the State in protecting the most vulnerable children.
The courts have also voiced their concerns. Judges have criticised situations wherein children in State care have not been allocated a social worker despite the court ordering and requiring it. In some cases, hundreds of children were reported to have been without an assigned social worker at any given time. One judge recently described that situation as both shocking and extraordinary. When members of the Judiciary begin to use language of that nature, what they are saying cannot be called a casual remark. It is and should be a warning that something within the system is not functioning as it should.
We have also heard of troubling incidents involving children missing from care and vulnerable young people being placed in emergency accommodation because suitable placements were not available. In fact, emergency arrangements that were intended to be exceptional have instead become the norm and a recurrence within this failing system. That fact alone should cause all of us in this House to pause and reflect.
Tusla now operates with a budget that exceeds €1 billion. If I am not mistaken, it is nearly €1.3 billion. Hundreds of millions of euro are being distributed through funding arrangements within community organisations and voluntary services providing and delivering on behalf of the State. Many of those organisations do valuable and necessary support work but when the expenditure reaches such a scale, governance must be strong and accountability must be clear.
That brings us to the central issue. The current system is built on a structure where responsibility is fragmented. Policy sits with the Department of children and operational delivery sits with the Tusla, a separate statutory agency. A large number of services are delivered through exceptional and external organisations funded through various programmes. This layered structure creates a distance between the authority and the accountability. When problems arise, as we have seen, responsibility becomes diffused across multiple levels of the system. When the protection of children is involved, we must have absolute clarity about that responsibility. When a child enters the care of the State, the child becomes the responsibility of the Republic itself. The question before this House is not whether Tusla performs important work; we all realise and accept that it does perform important work when it works well. The question is whether the governance structure surrounding that work remains fit for purpose.
Other jurisdictions across Europe and further afield have confronted similar questions and adopted different types of models. In many countries, child protection services operate directly within the ministerial department. Policies, operations, leadership and accountability exist within a single structure. Is that not a good idea, to have one single structure? The responsibility is clear, accountability is direct and a state cannot distance itself from the outcome of the system.
There is a principle that should guide us for this entire debate. When the State removes a child from their home, the State does not simply become a service provider; the State becomes the child's parents in every meaningful sense. The State assumes the responsibility for that child - that child's safety, that child's well-being and that child's future. No parents would accept a situation where responsibility for their child was unclear, where a system failed without consequences or where a system failed without accountability between different institutions. The State must hold itself to no lower standard. Children who enter the care of the State are not just statistics; they are not just reports; they are not simple entries in an administrative system. They are young people whose lives depend on the decisions we make in this House on the systems that structure the governance. If the structure responsible for the protection of them is not working, it should be the duty of all Members of this House not to defend the structure but to reform that structure.
That is why this motion is important to this House. It proposes a carefully responsive process. It proposes that the Government commission an independent review, examining whether the current model remains the best structure for delivering child protection services. It proposes the publication of a White Paper outlining the options for reform. It proposes structural reform to be implemented through a phased transitional period of 24 months to ensure continuity of services. That is not reckless; it is simple leadership.
Repeated inspections and court findings have given rise to public controversy and have raised concerns about the functionality of the system. The State cannot simply defend the status quo . The proposed Government amendment shows the State defending the status quo despite all the scandals, and the hand-wringing and crocodile tears in this House.
We must have the courage to ask if the system that we have built is a system that children deserve. This motion is not about blaming any individuals or criticising the dedicated professionals working within the system. It is about recognising a simple truth. Structures matter and institutions matter. When the structure responsible for protecting vulnerable children shows signs of strain, the duty of the State is to examine it honestly and reform where necessary. Children who rely on State protection deserve a system that is clear and accountable, capable of acting decisively where their safety is at risk. Front-line professionals deserve leadership and support rather than leaving them carry on under the heavy burden of weaknesses. For that reason, I commend the motion to the House.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-03-19/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:45+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-03-19