No social worker for 1,000 high risk kids

Almost 1,000 “high-priority” cases involving at-risk children had not been assigned a social worker by the end of last year.

According to the Health Information and Quality Authority’s (Hiqa’s) annual overview report on the inspection and regulation of children’s services in 2015, there is a “significant variation in services” available to children depending on what part of the country they reside.

At the end of 2015, Tusla had 26,655 cases open with 6,718 yet to be allocated a social worker. Of these, 999 were classed as “high priority”.