Ireland’s child protection watchdog can give no “cast iron guarantee” the RTÉ creche scandal is not being repeated in other services after it emerged 37 other creches are on a high-risk safety register.

A family who removed their child from the Hide and Seek creche service at the centre of an RTÉ exposé raised concerns about the facility with politicians and child protection services more than a year ago.

A protest is to take place today outside one of the creches featured in an RTÉ Investigates exposé.

Tusla has confirmed that the Garda Child Protection Unit at Mountjoy Garda Station has begun an investigation with the Tusla Social Work Unit, into the issues raised by the documentary.

An undercover investigation had revealed a pattern of disturbing behaviour and practices including fire-safety breaches and rough handling of children.

Tusla has said it has been proactively addressing areas of non-compliance with regulations in three crèches since 2018, following an RTÉ investigation.

A report into the deaths of children either in care or known to the care services has referred to social work departments being under serious pressure with high referral rates and experiencing staff shortages that “inevitably impacted on their ability to provide a good quality service”.

A total of 22 children and young people in care or known to the child protection system, died in 2017, the panel tasked with charting such deaths has said.

Freshly Chopped is facing closure of one of its flagship outlets after it was refused retention planning permission for its branch on Dublin’s Grafton St.

Payroll overpayments in excess of €1m, €4.7m spent on goods and services without proper procurement, and weaknesses in oversight and monitoring of grants to outside agencies are among the concerns flagged in the 2017 annual financial statements of Tusla, the child and family agency.

Tusla, the child and family agency, has been found to have “serious failings” in how it carries out its role.

It was his grandmother and father who instilled the value of money in Dublin entrepreneur Brian Lee — he insists those life lessons serve him well to this day as his Freshly Chopped health food brand expands throughout the country.

One of the country’s fastest growing food chains has officially opened in Cork, with an eye on more expansion in the city before the end of the year.

Health food outlet Chopped is looking at Cork as one of its major regions for growth, company bosses said after announcing more than 400 jobs in Ireland and the UK.

One quarter of complaints made about early-years services for children in 2015 related to child safety.

Tusla, the Child and Family Agency, says it supports a move to having private children’s residential care centres being independently inspected as suggested in a report highlighting major shortfalls in the process.

More than 230 children in Cork assessed as being at high risk of harm, did not have an allocated social worker.

A report on pre-schools, nurseries, creches, and day- care centres has found that children had access to dangerous materials, that some centres were damp and rodent-infested, and that there were several instances where staff did not receive Garda clearance to work with children.

COUNTY player Aonghus Callanan hit 0-5 from play as city side Liam Mellows, who won the last of their seven Galway SHC titles back in 1970, advanced to the quarter-finals at Athenry yesterday, seeing off Sarsfields 0-13 to 0-11.

AT least seven people were killed in the first blast in a tube tunnel at 8.51am, but eyewitnesses spoke of seeing many bodies in the wreckage of the train.