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THE HEAD OF Tusla has said that children as young as 12 are arriving unaccompanied from Ukraine and being taken into care by Irish authorities.
Bernard Gloster said this morning that the Child and Family Agency was caring for 14 Ukrainian children out of 95 youths across the system who are separated from their families and seeking international protection.
He said that Tusla has received 32 referrals of unaccompanied minors since the start of the war, 18 of whom were admitted to care. Four of those children were later discharged after being reunited with family or relatives.
“They would be predominantly from young to late teens, but as recently as yesterday we received a 12-year-old into care,” he told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland programme.
Gloster said that children referred to Tusla after being separated from their families in war zones, such as those from Ukraine, Somaila and Afghanistan, often flee conflict as part of large groups where it appears their family is present.
They are usually discovered to be unaccompanied after arriving into points of entry when their details are processed.
Gloster said that Tusla is currently liaising with port authorities to ensure that children who have been separated are discovered as soon as they enter the country.
“We took the decision on 16 March… to actually establish a presence with the airport authorities in the multi-agency response,” he said.
“So we’re out there from half nine every morning to half two the following morning. I intend to keep that up and, depending on the scale of the demand over the next couple of weeks, at various other ports and centres we may have to mobilise a larger work force.”
Gloster said that Tusla staff at ports are also working with immigration services and government departments to ensure that children arriving with adults who are not their parents are not being trafficked.
“There are processes for discussing and obviously looking for any signs of distress,” he said.
“But where children are travelling with adults who are not their own parents, their details will be taken and where they’re going to be placed – either with a family or in hotel accommodation – those details will be made known centrally into the Tusla register…
“And we will be following up on those to ensure the greatest level of protection where we can.
“There are always risks in responding to mass refugee status, and I think we have to remember, in Eurocentric terms, this is the biggest movement of people seeking protection since World War 2; that does come with hazards and dangers.”
Gloster also said that unaccompanied children are receiving the same type of State care as other children, as well as more targeted care to help overcome language barriers and the fact that they are coming from a conflict.
Of the 14 children taken into care from Ukraine so far, one is in residential care, nine are with foster families and another four, who are around 17 and are heading towards adulthood, are in supported lodgings.
Gloster said foster families for Ukrainian children are assessed in the same way as foster parents normally are, through interviews and home visits as well as Garda vetting.
He added that Tusla is also assisting Gardaí, the Red Cross and the Government in carrying out vetting on host families for all Ukrainian arrivals.
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The producers are bluffing the EU, Ireland is doing it right. Aldi and Lidl do this here too – you can see exactly where the fish was caught, how it was caught and even the scientific name of the kind of fish. It obviously doesn’t cost Aldi and Lidl huge amounts to respect customers enough to supply information.
New law! How about enforcing the old laws that would be a start.
Closing the stable door after the horse has bolted.
This is why intelligent humans choose vegetarianism.
@Tommy_Bannon: Closing the stable door after the horse was eaten , to be more precise
Don’t forget there are plenty of intelligent people who eat meat too.
If you want to be healthy try cutting animal products from your diet. Processed meat that comes in a packet can’t be good for you. Either can milk from another animal that full of hormones and puss..
European milk does not contain hormones or ‘puss’. Every delivery from every farm is checked for temperature, antibiotics, bacteria etc. So stop spreading downright lies about the food we produce.
@Mick: of course there’s hormones in milk. You do realise dairy cows are constantly impregnated to produce milk. Cows like women are full of hormones while pregnant and those naturally produced hormones go into their milk to help bulk up calves. Its not intended for human consumption.. If you’re happy drinking and eating another animals milk go ahead.. Each to their own i suppose
I’m a dairy farmer myself. I understand completely the process works. What you are implying is false though. Natural, grass fed milk contains nothing untoward, we’ve been drinking milk for thousands of years. It’s when people start adding sugar and salt, E numbers and artificial chemical additives is when the trouble starts.
@Mick: Mick im not implying anything false. Cows milk is full of hormones, hormones that nature intends to help calves bulk up hundreds of pounds. It is not intended for children or adults to consume.
The natural hormones in milk are not in unusual quantities to cause any harm in humans. The levels of protein, butterfat etc in the 6L+ of milk that a calf consumes are responsible for growth. Generations of Irish people have eaten beef, dairy, eggs etc without issue. Obesity has only become an issue in this country since the 70′s, due to the advent of cheap, highly processed foods, the likes of coca cola with 30g+ of sugar per serving.
@Cosmo Kramer: backtrack much?
What about products labelled as Irish but brought down from the Uk?
No mention of take always etc imposing their religious beliefs on you, if you buy a ham pizza at many hundred placed you may be served dyed turkey NOT ham because these people don’t have any respect for you, nor your freedom to eat what you choose. It is often written on menu boards but often it won’t; it is dishonest but not illegal make sure your ham is not turkey meat dyed pink a common practice these days but The EU respect our rights on these issues.
Any particular reason a Lidl own-brand product was chosen to illustrate the story? Is there something we should be told?
Anybody .anywhere.here or abroad held accountable for putting shit into our food in the form of un regulated horse meat?anyone..
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