Child and Family Agency
Dail Éireann — 2026-04-23
============================================================

Ruairí Ó Murchú (SF), Louth

What is the process as regards how the Minister deals with those separated children seeking international protection and a disputed age? It is necessary to deal with that as quickly as possible from a child protection point of view?
I accept Tusla is dealing with far more significant issues in relation to the complexity of issues that are in front of it and the increase in the number of those separated children, but all of us were impacted by what we watched last night on "RTÉ Investigates", in particular, the case of Max. The Minister talked of children who find themselves in these particular situations and facilities always being monitored but we heard how it looks like Max, who has his own issues and complexities, at some level was left alone, found himself in a scenario where he was abused and nobody noticed for something like two-and-a-half hours. There had been a huge issue in relation to those who have gone missing for a significant time. What we need to see is a framework, that appropriate accommodation is found and we stop using unregulated facilities that are not suitable in any way, shape or form.

---

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/2026-04-23/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:54:48+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-04-23