Children in Care
Dail Éireann — 2026-09-17
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Mattie McGrath (IND), Tipperary South

I agree with the Minister about the vast majority, thankfully, but it is the minority who are involved in this behaviour. It is also a sad minority who have gone missing in State care under the watch of Tusla. A previous Minister said he did not lose a wink of sleep. Pat Rabbitte is a former chairman of the board of Tusla. I think Tusla is wholly unfit for purpose. Goodness, accountability is not there. Children can go missing. We saw from the UCD report some time ago how children were being trafficked in hotels in Cork when they were under State care. This is a shocking vista. You cannot just wish it away by saying the vast majority of children are not involved in antisocial behaviour. Thankfully, they are not. We all have responsibilities, including parents, to ensure that. However, the ones who fall through the cracks and who do end up in State care deserve to be minded, nurtured, rehabilitated and taken care of and, above all, the State should know where they are. If they are not with their family and are in State care, the State should know where they are, whether they are accounted for, whether they are missing or whether they are being trafficked or involved in other horrible activities like that. It is a shocking situation.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-09-17/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-28T05:50:48+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-09-17