HSE to complete children in care review by summer

THE HSE hopes to have completed a capacity review of some of its services for children in care by the summer, it emerged yesterday.

Gordon Jeyes, the recently-appointed national director for Children and Family Services, said the capacity review of alternative care arrangements for the small number of children who required special care placements was already under way, and that the results of that first phase would be available in a few months, with results from a review of the wider system following on from that.

He said a lot of money was spent on “special arrangements” for a small number of children who needed to be brought into the system for their own protection and for whom there was no places available, but he said he did not mind the cost as long as they were effective.