Most children's homes do not vet staff

Children are left vulnerable as the HSE fails to make basic checks on residential centres. By Emma Browne

The majority of children's residential centres in the HSE Eastern region failed to meet national standards for children's residential services in 2005. Documents seen by Village show that a majority of the centres are failing to adequately vet all employees. The HSE is also failing to monitor these centres as required under the national standards. The National Standards for Children's Residential Centres say that all staff must received Garda clearance and they must have three references on their file. Additionally, all the centres should be monitored by a HSE monitoring officer, and reports issued annually. Neither of these two standards have been met across a majority of the centres.

This information is contained in 10 reports done by the HSE inspection and registration service in the Eastern region in 2005. These reports assess whether the children's residential centres are meeting the national standards. They were released to Village under a Freedom of Information application.

The HSE reports show that in nine of the 10 children's residential centres inspected, not all of the employees had been Garda-vetted and not all had the three references as required.

In 1994, the Department of Health and Children directed that all staff in children's residential centres must have Garda clearance and that there must be three references for each employee. The national standards reiterated this.

In 2002, the Garda Síochána set up the Central Vetting Unit to deal with such clearances. However, there has been ongoing problems with its resources to vet all people working with children. In 2004, the Minister for Children, Brian Lenihan, announced that all people working with children would be vetted, but this only commenced in 2005.

Two of the HSE inspection and registration reports highlight some of the current problems with delays in vetting. One children's residential centre had to wait six months for Garda clearance for potential employees and this led to some staff taking jobs elsewhere. The inspector recommended that this delay must be addressed "at a departmental level between the HSE and the Department of Justice".

In another centre, the Garda Central Vetting Unit has refused to vet any employees of the agency that runs the centre. The reason for this was not given.

The reports also showed that the HSE was failing to monitor these centres and produce annual reports. Under the National Standards for Children's Residential Services, a HSE monitoring officer is supposed to visit the centre to check that it is complying with childcare regulations and best practice. Written reports should be made available on an annual basis to senior managers and inspectors. Seven of the 10 centres had not received a formal visit from the monitor. And in the one centre that a monitoring officer had visited, they had been unable to complete a written report as required because of lack of resources. The inspector said: "The HSE must address the issue of a lack of resources in order to enable the monitor to carry out their role and responsibility in full, as outlined in the National Standard for Children's Residential Centres."

The HSE inspection and registration service carries out inspections on all private and voluntary organisations that accommodate children in State care. The Social Services Inspectorate carries out inspections of centres run by the HSE.

The inspection and registration service deemed that all these centres passed registration in 2005 and could continue to accommodate children.