Children in Care Dail Éireann — 2026-04-28 ============================================================ Norma Foley (FF), Kerry I thank the Deputies for raising this important issue. In order to overcome the challenges within the care system that were highlighted on the programme and which have been raised by the Deputies, which I acknowledge, the Department secured an overall increase of €177 million for Tusla in the most recent budget. That is representing a 14% increase in Tusla's budget over 2025. This brings Tusla's total budget to over €1.4 billion. Additionally, Tusla plans to invest a total of €286 million in expanding mainstream residential care in 2026; an additional €53 million of current funding compared with 2025. As I mentioned previously this evening, 96% of all children in State care are placed in foster care or residential care. In this regard, in addition to building on the capacity of mainstream residential placements for children, prioritisation has also been given to building on supports with respect to foster care, which resulted in a 21% increase to the foster care allowance in 2024, a new initial placement payment to foster carers, improved travel allowances and greater access to therapeutic and peer supports. I want to assure the Deputes that officials within the Department are proactively engaging with their counterparts in Tusla to continue to build on the supports that foster carers can avail of. The Department also expanded Tusla's capital budget to €35 million in 2026, which represents growth of 100% since 2024. That refers to the provision of additional residential places. This investment will support Tusla to expand its residential care, as has been outlined by the Deputies, including the provision of step-down units for children leaving special care. Three new step-down units are scheduled to come on stream. Two will become available in December of this year and one in January of next year. This will, in turn, add to capacity in special care going forward. As I said, significant work has also been undertaken to reduce the number of unregistered special emergency arrangements. Last year, there were 170 such facilities and we now have reduced this number to 70. We will continue to do more in this space going forward. I would also like to confirm to the House that the Department has also engaged with children and young people on a consistent basis in the past year both through the care experiences project and through the significant consultation that has been undertaken as part of the development of a new national policy framework for alternative care. Combined, this research and policy development will allow us, as a State, for the very first time, to take a strategic approach towards the future of the care system, guided by the lived experience of the young people who have first-hand experience of the care system. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-04-28/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:52+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-04-28