The Final Report of the Task Force on the Child and Family Support Agency has been published which will guide the work of the Agency. The agency will be led by CEO Designate Gordon Jeyes.
The report, according to the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Frances Fitzgerald TD, “represents a vitally important part of this government’s reform programme”. She added: “At the heart of the new Agency will be a new Service Delivery Framework, which will differentiate between child welfare and protection cases, such that family and child welfare concerns can be responded to by new multi-agency, community-based models for early intervention and family support. The new Agency will represent the practical application of a new approach towards ‘proportionate’ service responses – an approach which will be also at the heart of the Constitutional Amendment on Child Protection which will put before the people later this year.
Key reforms to be progressed by the Agency include: the creation of multidisciplinary local teams; the streamlining of local services under one local manager; and the establishment of a single, consistent mechanism for assessment, referrals and tracking supported by a new child protection notification system.
Last week the Cabinet approved the drafting of legislation to establish this new agency.