HIQA has said it has grave concerns about the high number of children living in direct provision, who have been referred to the Child and Family Agency.
The authority says around 14% of the population of children living in these centres were referred to the Child and Family Agency in one year, compared to 1.6% for the general child population.
It has issued a set of recommendations to Tusla.
In the year to August 2014, there were around 1,600 children living in direct provision accommodation.
Of these, there were 209 referrals of child protection and welfare concerns relating to 229 children.
Sinn Féin's Padraig MacLochlainn, chair of the Oireachtas Committee on Public Services Oversight and Petitions, has said it is not acceptable and the high number of referrals is just one reason why the current system should be abandoned.
“You’re seeing now again and against that the direct provision system is no place to have children,” he said.
“(In the) general population about 1.6% would be the normal standard of referrals to TUSLA but in the case of the direct provisions centres it’s 14%.
“There’s also the concern that the Children’s Ombudsman doesn’t have appropriate oversight of the system.
“Yet again it points to the reality that this system is not fit for purpose and it should be scrapped,” he added.
Among the issues identified were physical or mental illness of a parent impacting on capacity to provide quality care for children; mental health issues for children and parents; isolation; and lack of clothes and toys.
Protection concerns raised include children being left alone for long periods of time, as well as proximity of children to unknown adults living on the same site - and inappropriate contact by adults towards some children.
HIQA points to significant delays in social work interventions in Louth/Meath, and in a particular case in Laois Offaly there was one referral about a child threatening suicide where the child was waiting three years for a response from the social work team.
HIQA carried out inspections in Louth/Meath, the Midlands, Sligo Leitrim and West Cavan and Dublin North City.
In a statement this afternoon, Chief Executive of Tusla Gordon Jeyes says his Chief Operations Officer is now overseeing a rapid improvement programme which involves deploying temporary additional resources to deal with any backlog.
Originally posted at 12.05pm
