No social worker hired three months after shortages criticised

Three months after an Ombudsman’s report found children at risk in Cork City and county were being let down by under-resourced social services, not one new social worker has been drafted into the area.

The investigation, which was published by the Ombudsman for Children, found the HSE did not do all it could to protect children in Cork’s North Lee catchment area. The report identified serious deficits, including it taking three to seven months for a social worker to be allocated to cases.

A month later, a Hiqa report into social work services around the country found that children in the same catchment area, which extends from Ballyvourney to Youghal, and covers Macroom, Midleton, and Cobh, as well as the city’s northside, were not being assigned a social worker for more than a year.