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.