Special care system a ‘disaster’, claims Gilroy

THE system of special care is in chaos and needs to be thoroughly reviewed, a Cork-based senator has said following a damning Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) report on Gleann Alainn.

John Gilroy, who worked as a psychiatric nurse in St Stephen’s hospital, where the troubled unit is based, said the situation was a “disaster”.

His comments came after HIQA published a report which found an extraordinary litany of ongoing failures including girls going missing in the middle of the night, stolen keys, out of control behaviour, self-harming, and staff who could not cope.

Mr Gilroy, who is to raise the issue with Health Minister James Reilly, said he has been aware of serious problems within the unit for many years. He said staff at the centre, one of three in the country, were not trained properly and that there were “legacy issues”.

He said he believed the situation was symptomatic of the chaos within childcare services as a whole.

“We have to look at the whole way in which we deal with these young people.

“This is a very important service for vulnerable children and it is important that we get it right. I am calling for a thorough review of how we run special care units. We can’t look at this on its own — we need to look at the whole system.”

Meanwhile, senior Garda sources have indicated they are becoming increasingly frustrated with the situation. Gardaí raised concerns about security at the facility as far back as 11 years ago.

Gardaí from Glanmire have been inundated with calls to the centre over the years, and are regularly called upon to trace teenage girls who have gone missing. A senior Garda source said: “A significant amount of resources are committed to trying to track down minors who go missing from the place. We are also called to the centre to deal with unruly behaviour and damage.”

Gordon Jeyes, HSE national director for children and family services, said what was going on was “unacceptable”, but that the institution had been caught at a point of particular difficulty.

He said yesterday the HSE was aware that management arrangements were not sufficient and that action was being taken to remedy this. He said an acting manager had been replaced temporarily and the post had been advertised. He said agency staff should not be used for the most vulnerable children and said that steps were being taken to remedy this.

He also said he believed the unit could be turned around and that there would be improvements very soon.

HIQA has said it will carry out another inspection of Gleann Alainn in January.