Welfare services - Childcare neglect on a grand scale

THIS was supposed to have been a story consigned to the past, a shameful one that would never recur.

We were assured that after the tragedy in Monageer, Co Wexford, in April of last year, that Health Service Executive social workers would be available 24/7 to intervene if children were thought to be in jeopardy.

You will remember that in Monageer, Adrian Dunne, 29, his wife Ciara, 24, and their two children, five-year-old Leanne and three-year-old Shania, were found dead, three days after the family visited an undertaker to arrange how the couple and their children might be buried. It later emerged that the authorities were aware of the risk to the Dunnes’ children but because the tragedy took place over a weekend, social welfare workers were unavailable.

Today we report on a similar, though thankfully, far less tragic story.

On Tuesday night a boy of 15, who had run away from his foster home, spent the night in a Garda station because gardaí could not get a response from a HSE emergency number.

Gardaí say the HSE mobile was turned off.

Once again a HSE failure challenges the power of words to describe how unacceptable such negligence is.

Once again the gardaí are seen to be a caring, socially aware and proactive organisation. What a pity the same cannot be said of all our public organisations.

It is incomprehensible that a social welfare department is run on office hours, as if tragedy operated to a timetable. It is akin to having a war correspondent who wants to go home for his tea — it’s just not possible.

Undoubtedly many social workers are totally committed to what can be a harrowing job but be that as it may the system is plainly not fit for purpose.

We’ve all heard the stories about children waiting unimaginably long periods for various assessments. We’ve all heard how HSE staff are terribly overstretched but no matter how much sympathy you can muster for a HSE employee the greater sympathy must lie with the person in need of their services.

We have all heard too the stories of scandalous waste, of HSE workers struggling to pass the day because there is nothing for them to do in the positions they are in.

Again this is a failure of management. It is their job to ensure that emergency services are in place and that they can be contacted and that they react in appropriate time frames. Huge numbers of workers are on call even if they are not working; does that not apply to HSE social workers and if not, why not?

However, there may be light at the end of the tunnel.

It is understood that the Monageer inquiry into the Dunne tragedy is likely to make recommendations regarding the non-operation of childcare services during out-of-work hours. What that recommendation might be only time will tell. Whether it is implemented or not is another matter altogether

The Monageer report raises another worrying trend. The report is complete but will not be published until it is approved as libel free by the authors’ legal team.

This sounds entirely plausible but should the report not be a warts-and-all description of what went on, not some sanitised, conflict-free discussion paper?

It may be just a tad too cynical to suggest that our libel laws are being used to bury criticism of public servants but it would not be entirely surprising.

Tuesday night’s sorry story joins a litany of HSE cock-ups and though it is easy to always blame management there must be more to it than poor leadership. Could it be that the commitment to public service in our public service is a lot less than it should be?