Child services to face inspections

The health watchdog expects to begin a wave of extended inspections into aspects of child protection services before the end of the year.

The Health Information & Quality Authority (Hiqa) yesterday launched a public consultation on new guidelines for national standards for the protection and welfare of children.

It wants to hear from members of the public and stakeholders on the guidelines, which are divided across six themes, ahead of the May 17 closing date.

The standards will be reviewed before being passed on to Frances Fitzgerald, the children’s minister. Pending approval, work on monitoring the standards will then begin, meaning a new review regime covering areas such as foster care and local management decision making within the HSE.

Ms Fitzgerald said: “The introduction of the standards will ensure that the Children First guidance, which say how concerns about child neglect and abuse should be dealt with, will be implemented consistently across the county.

“The standards will assist the identification of strengths and weakness by managers and staff and will be inspected against by Hiqa.”

Launching the standards yesterday, Niall Byrne, the deputy director of the Social Services Inspectorate, said they would operate across a range of services and involve greater accountability within the HSE.

The themes are child-centred care, safe and effective services, governance, leadership and management, use of resources, workforce and use of information.

The inspections will check that all these guidelines are being correctly followed, and Mr Byrne said: “We would be looking at the HSE to show clear evidence that they are using the resources they have in the most effective way.”

Inspections will initially target areas where historically there has been systems weaknesses, with Mr Byrne saying the inspections regime would be “led by risk”.

www.hiqa.ie