Child protection and welfare referrals to Tusla double in a decade

latest annual report shows it received almost 92,000 child protection and welfare referrals last year — up 11% on 2022, and twice the number seen when Tusla was established in 2014.

The number of child protection and welfare referrals to Tusla has doubled in just a decade, with the latest surge blamed on the housing crisis, immigration, poverty, and domestic violence.

The agency’s latest annual report shows it received almost 92,000 child protection and welfare referrals last year — up 11% on 2022, and twice the number seen when Tusla was established in 2014.

The rise — also fuelled by criminality, drugs, and exploitation — is putting it under significant pressure to find emergency and alternative care accommodation, the report says.

Tusla chief executive Kate Duggan said these pressures are being compounded by growing numbers of children and young people with “more complex needs”, along with ongoing difficulties in recruiting social workers and social care staff.

Key figures in the report show:

• There were 91,924 referrals in 2023, up 11% on 2022 — and a 26% hike on 2021;
• 22,082 cases were open in 2023;
• 5,615 children were in alternative care at year end;
• 96% of children in care are in full-time education.
• Admissions to care was up 10%, from 813 to 892;
• And there has been a “marked increase” in numbers of unaccompanied and separated children seeking international protection, with 530 referrals — 178 of which relate to unaccompanied Ukrainian children.

The report said there were 962 children “active” on the Child Protection Notification System at the end of 2023.

All had been allocated to a social worker.

The relatively new system is described as a secure database, containing a national record of all children who have reached the threshold of being at ongoing risk of significant harm and where there are ongoing child protection concerns.

In the foreword, Ms Duggan said the increase in referrals is in the context of wider societal issues “such as the housing crisis, global movement, poverty, domestic and gender-based violence, drugs, criminality, and exploitation”.

She said these factors have “certainly presented challenges”, particularly around the supply of emergency and alternative care placements.

Ms Duggan said the agency still experiences workforce supply issues.

“We noted an increase in the number of children and young people with more complex needs, who also require access to other specialist services to better meet their needs,” said.

“Now more than ever, it is vital that all departments and agencies come together to meet the needs of these children and young people with a whole-of-government response.”

Tusla chairman Pat Rabbitte said the unique area of special care — involving the placing of children in secure therapeutic facilities — has “severely stretched” the capacity of the agency, in both accommodation and staff in 2023.