The use of Special Emergency Arrangements (SEAs) as settings for vulnerable children to be housed must be brought to an end, according to Social Democrats children spokesperson Aidan Farrelly.<\/p>\n
Deputy Farrelly said:<\/p>\n
\u201cThe number of children in Special Emergency Arrangements has almost doubled in the past two years<\/p>\n
\u201cDespite criticism from several judges and advocacy groups, TUSLA has continued to increase its reliance on SEAs for children in care – these placements are not subject to inspections by the Health Information Quality Authority.<\/p>\n
\u201cTUSLA has been told on countless occasions that Special Emergency Arrangements for unaccompanied children are inappropriate and present serious risk.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt has been reported that 15 companies shared \u20ac56 million in profits from operating Special Emergency Arrangement premises in 2024. It\u2019s not TUSLA staff who work in these services, and HIQA are not entitled to inspect them.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese placements are being operated by companies instead of state bodies, and no one can independently ascertain the quality of the services being provided.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are outstanding questions surrounding the qualifications of staff at these sites, the types of care and activities provided for children and young people, the initiatives in place for when trauma manifests itself through violence or other harmful behaviour, the duration of stay for residents, and, ultimately, the rationale for outsourcing this type of provision to third-party contractors.<\/p>\n
\u201cSEAs are not appropriate settings for vulnerable children to be housed. This practice, which puts children at risk, must be brought to an end in favour of increasing State capacity for care.\u201d<\/p>\n
March 11th, 2026<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The use of Special Emergency Arrangements (SEAs) as settings for vulnerable children to be housed must be brought to an end, according to Social Democrats children spokesperson Aidan Farrelly. Deputy Farrelly said: \u201cThe number of children in Special Emergency Arrangements has almost doubled in the past two years \u201cDespite criticism from several judges and advocacy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11557,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[396,540,7,693],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aidan-farrelly","category-children","category-press-release","category-tusla"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n