More emergency applications to take children into care were made in Letterkenny last year than in any other town in the country, according to data released by the Child Care Law Reporting Project.
Only the cities of Dublin and Cork, which serve much larger populations, had more emergency applications. An emergency care order is applied for at the District Court when gardaí and Tusla, the Child and Family Agency, believe there is an immediate and serious risk to a child’s health or welfare.
In 2015, according to data collected by the Courts Service and analysed by the project, 26 emergency applications were made at Letterkenny District Court, in Co Donegal.
And overall, the court saw a total of 1,117 applications related to childcare, also more than any other town. These included almost 450 full care order applications, normally made to keep children in the care of the State until adulthood.
Only Dublin and Cork had higher overall numbers of child care applications; 2,003 and 2,472 respectively, and the cities had emergency applications of 82 and 41. They both had fewer full care order applications than Letterkenny, with 128 and 230 respectively.
Midlands towns
Wexford court also had relatively high childcare figures; there were 935 applications, including 18 emergency care applications and almost 350 full care order applications.
For the fifth year running, all applications in midland towns were significantly lower than elsewhere. Longford, Kilkenny, Tullamore, Carlow and Portlaoise saw far fewer applications for interim care orders, care orders and supervision orders than other towns of similar size.
In Kilkenny, there were only 13 court applications last year, 10 of which were granted, three were adjourned and there were no emergency applications.
Nationally, more than 13 per cent of applications were either refused, withdrawn or struck out. But in some courts, the rate was much higher.
In Carlow, 123 applications were dealt with and only five were granted, with 89 withdrawn, struck out or refused, and 35 adjourned. In Castlebar, 55 applications were granted and 41 were refused, withdrawn or stuck out, and in Waterford, the figures were 287 and 162 respectively.
By comparison, in Dublin, of just over 2,000 applications, the vast majority, 1,795, were granted, while 19 were refused and 189 struck out or withdrawn.
The data, analysed for the fifth year in a row by the project, showed an overall increase of more than 40 per cent in court applications related to the protection of children, up from almost 9,870 in 2014 to more than 14,100 in 2015.
Court activity
While the figures reflected an increase in court activity, there was no increase in children coming into care; there were 6,388 in care in 2015, 75 fewer than in 2014.
Dr Carol Coulter, director of the project, said the figures showed different practices by different courts around the country. "They also show wide variation in the volumes of applications dealt with," she said.
Some of the differences between courts may be explained by the way applications are filed and dealt with in different courts and by double-counting, she said. And the inclusion of categories “review of care order” and “extension of care order” in the data collecting also pushed up the total number of childcare matters recorded.
Dr Coulter said while some of the wide disparities reflected different court and recording practice, they must also reflect different practices by Tusla in bringing applications. “This may reflect a greater use of voluntary care in some parts of the country, or higher levels of family support,” she said.
