NSPCC role ‘needs to be properly addressed’

PARENTS who requested their children back from industrial reform schools were frequently ignored, and the child was often regarded as a commodity of the state, according to a UCC history researcher.

Sarah-Anne Buckley, currently studying unpublished NSPCC case files for a doctoral thesis, maintains that the involvement of the NSPCC (now the ISPCC) inspector in the removal of children from the home to residential institutions needs to be sufficiently addressed in the debate surrounding the Ryan report.

According to the report’s findings, while the NSPCC played an important role in committing children, the extent of its involvement cannot be accurately ascertained because of a lack of documentation.