𝗥𝗶𝗽𝘁 𝗡𝗲𝘄𝘀 𝗠𝗲𝗱𝗶𝗮 𝗜𝗿𝗲𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗱 🔉🌏 RT

The Irish Git (Telegram)

From alliance of birth mother's for justice

COMMISSION SET UP IN 2016 THAT HAS COST €7 M SO FAR TO INVESTIGATE WHY GRACE WAS LEFT IN ABUSIVE FOSTER HOME FINDS THAT FOSTER PARENTS HAD PRIOR CRIMINAL CONVICTIONS. SOME OF THE PEOPLE RESPONSIBLE FOR GRACE WENT ON TO WORK FOR TUSLA

Unless you have been living under a rock for the last five years you will already know about Grace the intellectually disabled woman left in a foster home despite social workers knowing that she was being sexually abused.

A decision was made in 1996 to remove her from the foster home because of sexual abuse concerns but this was subsequently reversed by a three-person health board committee.(1)

She was left in the house for another 14 years.

In 2016 Grace was awarded €6.3 million in damages from the HSE which apologised for the systemic failures in her care during her time in the foster home.(2)

Justine McCarthy reported last November that the foster father wrote to Michael Noonan, then the minister for health, in 1996 asking him to intervene to keep Grace in the home, saying that she enjoyed “a happy and secure life” with the family.(1)

A commission of inquiry chaired by Marjorie Farrelly, a senior counsel was set up in 2016 and was due to submit its final report in 2018.

The enquiry has cost €7 million to date and has been granted several extensions. (3)

The Irish Examiner reports today that is has been given yet another extension to July 2022.(2)

Daniel McConnell the Examiner’s political editor reports that Grace was placed in the care of the foster parents despite them both having criminal convictions. (2)

Running to almost 800 pages, two interim reports seen by the Irish Examiner from the Farrelly Commission shows that the foster parents, referred to as ‘Mr and Mrs X’ had convictions for theft/larceny, yet were deemed fit to house Grace and other vulnerable young adults and children.

The report also clears former Health minister Michael Noonan over their handling of the case.

The report highlights “systemic failings” by the South Eastern Health Board (SEHB) which led to Grace being neglected to a point where she suffered repeated injuries to her body, required “significant dental work” and instances of inappropriate stripping went unreported.

The HSE was responsible for child welfare until this responsibility transferred to Tusla when it was set up in 2014.

Then chief executive of Tusla, Fred McBride along with Tusla chief operations officer, Jim Gibson who is a former HSE South East Regional manager appeared before the joint committee on children and youth affairs in June 2017 to discuss foster care services.(4)

Evelyn Ring in her report on the meeting published in the Examiner said:

“During the meeting, Sinn Féin TD Kathleen Funchion asked if staff involved in the Grace case were still employed by Tusla.

Mr McBride said he was not going to say much about the case because it was the subject of a commission of investigation.

Over the last year or so, he spent a long time trying to identify the staff involved in the case to discover whether or not they still worked for Tusla and whether they agency needed to do anything about it.

He said it was “only relatively recently” that the agency had managed to identify those involved.

“I worked hard to identify who the staff were and where they were, and for those staff that we identified as still being employees of Tusla, we put appropriate human resources processes in place.”

Ms Funchion pressed Mr McBride to say if some of them were still employed by Tusla. He replied: “Some of them are.”

Ms Funchion said she was surprised to hear that.

She thought a lot of people would be very shocked to hear that individuals involved in that “horrific” case at any level would still be employed by Tusla.

Tusla chief operations officer, Jim Gibson, said they had done absolutely everything within a legal framework to address the issue. He said t...

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