Children & Youth Affairs Minister Frances Fitzgerald today launched
Listen to Our Voices: Hearing Children and Young People Living in the Care of the State.
Listen to Our Voices is the report of consultations with 220 children and young people living in the care of the State, which sought their views on existing mechanisms for them to express their views and structures to be established for them to have a voice on decisions that affect their lives.
Speaking at the launch, the Minister commented: “Reading the report of these consultations, it is abundantly clear that there is a need to consult with young people on the services we provide for them. I was saddened to learn that many of these children and young people had rarely been asked for their opinion before now and, understandably, had difficulty in understanding the concept of having their voice heard. The report strongly highlights the need to facilitate and support them to express themselves. The experience of not being heard has been documented in a number of reports published in recent years. It is now time to embed participation in all decision making processes related to children and young people.”
Common themes and issues identified at the consultations by children and young people living in the care of the State included:
· The complexity and importance of regular access to birth parents and siblings;
· Being treated as ‘one of the family’ in foster care;
· The importance of assessment and vetting of as well as compulsory training for foster families;
· The lack of information available to young people in care, particularly on aftercare services which are not consistent in all locations.
The Minister noted:
this was a consultation process and not a research study and a disproportionate number of children in residential care took part, despite the fact that the vast majority of children in the care of the State are in foster care. However, the views of those who took part are valid and add strong value to the provision of a better understanding of the care experience for children and young people.
The Minister also met with 50 children and young people who had taken part in the consultations and were attending the launch. She invited them to sit on a Voice of Children in Care Implementation Group.
I am committed to overseeing that all aspects of the implementation process are informed by children and young people living in the care of the State.
Five young people, who took part in the consultations, spoke at the launch. Craig Byrne (17), Karen Conlon (19), Hassan Hussein Ali (19), Josephine Mooney (19) and Catherine Coventry (18) outlined the findings and recommendations from the report.
You can read their comments in the full press release here.