Some children placed in foster care in Dublin north central continue to be at risk despite efforts by the Health Service Executive to correct serious malpractice, the State's health watchdog has said.
The Health Information and Quality Authority said today some of the 329 children in the area were placed with un-assessed and unapproved foster carers. In some instances children were placed with carers who had been the subject of allegations of ill-treatment and had not been completely cleared by the executive.
Social work departments had classified these allegations as "inconclusive" due to the length of time it took the executive to investigate the complaints. There was also evidence of a number of allegations of a similar nature made about some foster carers over a protracted period of time by different and unrelated children, said the authority in a new inspection report published yesterday.
"Despite the extensive efforts of the area to assess and manage risk for all children, some children conitnued to be at risk.... This was unacceptable," said the authority.
The report is based on inspections undertaken by the authority in the Dublin north central area in March. The authority ordered the inspections to follow up on progress made since it published a damning report on the standard of foster care services in July 2010.
The report said there had been some positive changes over the past year, which included an increase in social work posts, a reduction in unallocated cases and improved local systems of gathering and maintaining information and care records. But the authority said delays in the assessment and approval of majority of foster carers continued, and the Children First Guidelines- the national code setting out how to respond to child protection concerns- are not fully implemented.