Almost 850 children who are considered ”high priority” welfare and protection cases by social services have not been allocated a social worker, writes Stephen Rogers.

According to figures released by Children’s Minister Katherine Zappone, there were 25,189 open child welfare and protection cases nationwide at the end of January. Of those, 80% or 20,173 had an allocated social worker. Of the remaining 5,016, 1,287 were classed “low priority”, 2,886 “medium priority” and 843 “high priority”.

Ms Zappone, in answer to a parliamentary question from Sinn Féin’s Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire, said that of the 843 high priority cases awaiting allocation, 271 are waiting less than a month, 194 one to three months, and 378 in excess of three months.

“Cases that are unallocated are closely monitored, supported, and managed by the duty social work team under the supervision of the principal social worker. Cases to be allocated to a social worker include children who have already received services from Tusla whose social worker is no longer available to them, as well as children waiting to be allocated for the first time. All unallocated cases are assessed and prioritised according to risk,” she said.

She also said that all urgent and emergency cases notified to Tusla, the Child and Family Agency are dealt with immediately: “Urgent and emergency cases could involve cases of abandonment, allegations of physical and sexual abuse, parental ill health and the need to find an immediate placement, or threat to the safety or life of a child by a third party.”

The waiting list for social workers has been blamed on a lack of staff: “Tusla currently has 1,467 whole-time-equivalent social workers and an end of 2017 target of 1,520 WTE.”

This article first appeared in theIrish Examiner.