Interview | Q&A with the Ombudsman for Children

Kai Brosnan caught up with Niall Muldoon, the Ombudsman for Children, in advance of Care Day to discuss role models, children’s rights and what Ireland’s long-term vision for our care system could look like.

Kai: So, Niall, who’s your role model?

Niall: Oh wow, role model. Probably Michael D Higgins. I think powerful, a powerful, courageous man who’s been doing the brave stuff, walking the walk since the 60s, you know. Talking about human rights when it was dangerous to talk about human rights. You know, and continuously putting people at the centre is his way of doing things.

Kai: What are your pet peeves?

Niall: Pet peeves. Oh, people who take up two parking spaces!

Kai: Obviously a very important question. Do you have any pets?

Niall: No, not at the moment. We had we had a number of cats when my children were growing up. Three different cats. Yeah, they were lovely

Kai: I’ve actually just gotten a cat recently. She’s a rescue, lovable but evil.

Naill: Oh yeah. We all know that we live in their world. It’s not the other way around.

Kai: Absolutely, absolutely.

Kai: Do you have any unusual hobbies or anything you like to do when you’re not at work?

Niall: I do a bit of biking, but my main hobby is sports psychology, so that’s sort of an interesting thing I do, and totally different. So, I work with high level teams trying to improve their performances, mainly around the GAA side of things, so hurling and football. It’s great. It’s an opportunity to get people to be as good as they can be, and I love doing that. It may or may not lead to winning something, but at least you’ve improved and you’re better.

Kai: Yeah, exactly. It’s the kind of steps towards improving and not just the final outcome.

Niall: Yeah. Yeah. Continuous progression. You know, my quote is always “progress, not perfection.”

Kai: Yeah, I like that. Actually, I have to remember that. I’m in my final year of college at the moment!

Niall: Yeah, because sometimes we spend too much time looking for perfection and the reality is more about – just keep moving forward, then you’re always improving.

Kai: Yeah, yeah, that’s the thing. Like, you’re kind of never back at step one. You’re always going on and on, which is nice, but it can be hard to see when you’re in the thick of it. Progress not perfection, something good to remember.

Niall: Brilliant. Yeah. What are you studying Kai?

Kai: I’m in my final year of social care.

Niall: Congratulations. Brilliant. Brilliant.

Kai: I qualified with a Level 7 last year and I’m doing my level eight this year, so I’m doing my thesis.

Niall: Oh fantastic. Oh, pulling your hair out, right? But it’ll be worth it.

Kai: A little bit, but I enjoy it. It’s something I’m really, passionate about. You know, like I was 15 writing you letters, giving out about things, and you were coming down to Kerry listening to me give out. Umm, so, you know, kind of activism and advocacy and the rights of people is something I’ve always been really, really passionate about.

Niall: That’s it. So, there’s a fit. It’s an actual fit, which is great.

Kai: Yeah. Yeah. No, I I love it.

Kai: If you could have any superpower, what would it be?

Niall: Wow. Umm. So, I’m going to be purely selfish. I’d love the superpower to be able to eat whatever I want and still be as fit as a fiddle. I’d love that.

Kai: I’ve never thought of that as a superpower. You’re going to have to write to Marvel with this now.

Niall: I’ve never thought about a superpower. What would I love that I can’t do? I’d love to be able to play music. I love people who can just step up and sing. Play a piano. You know, I think I just have great admiration for musicians, but superpowers. OK, superpowers. Um. Jeez, I’m not very good at this now.

Kai: And these are the easy questions.

Niall: Yes, the ability to make people laugh, perhaps?

Kai: Yeah, that’s a good one.

Kai: For someone that might not know, can you tell me a bit about your role as the Ombudsman and the Ombudsman for Children’s Office?

Niall: Our office is designed to promote and protect children’s rights all over Ireland. So, every child in Ireland, whether they’re born here or they’re just passing through or they’re living here from a different country, they all have the same rights. We promote the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which outlines 42 rights. We do that by taking complaints from children, or their representatives, parents or advocates, if they’re not happy with a service they get from the government. So, any service that’s provided by the government to children is under our remit. If they’re not happy, we can inquire into it or do an investigation and challenge them. So that could be anything from schools, hospitals, waiting lists, housing, justice, any of those sorts of areas at all where children and the government interact.

We provide advice to the government and to departments in relation to legislation and on policy, making sure they are child rights proofed. We engage with them on an ongoing basis around that, and we take the learnings from our investigation so that we can change the next policy or the next iteration or the next law to make sure that it doesn’t happen again.

We also raise awareness about children’s rights. We do consultations with children who are very seldom heard. So, we have worked with children who are in inpatient mental health units. We’ve talked to children in direct provision. We’ve talked to children experiencing homelessness. And we bring those consultations and their words directly to Parliament. We would oftentimes publish a report there. We’ve had children working in our Youth Advisory Panel who have gone to Geneva to speak directly to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child. So, we’re all the time trying to raise the voices of children through our consultations and letting the people of power hear them directly.

Kai: That’s amazing. ‘Cause I think, I think sometimes, you know, you need to learn from what went wrong before. And I think even today something that is so important, and it will always be important obviously, is the direct voice of the child or whoever you’re working with. And I think when it comes to children, sometimes that voice can be deemed less important. So, you know, having those groups where you’re making sure that they’re aware of their rights is important, they can’t have their rights upheld if they’re not aware of them.

Niall: Yeah, yeah, correct. And I think it’s going to make a difference because people, like yourself who are graduating, then they become the protectors of rights. And that makes all the difference. And then they become aunts and uncles, they become parents and they then push more for children’s rights as well. Even if you hope nobody ever needs us, but at least they know it’s there and it’s available.

Kai: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it’s kind of a ripple effect. Yeah, I didn’t think of it that way.

Kai: In terms of Ireland as a whole and the government, do you think we’re faring well in terms of promoting and upholding the rights of children in care and young people leaving care?

Niall: To be fair, I think Ireland is in reasonably good shape. I think the surveys would probably suggest that 75% of children are very happy with where they’re at and things are going well for them. And I think we’ve improved enormously from the old dark days of the 60s, 70s and 80s. If we compare ourselves against Europe, there’s a lot of things we’re doing right. But like we were saying before, progress not perfection.

We need to continuously progress and improve things. There’s lots of children with disabilities who aren’t being looked after properly, children with mental health issues, children within the LGBT+ community that are not being looked after, so there’s still a lot of work to be done.

Children’s rights are better than they have ever been before, but we’re pushing very hard now as an Office to get the incorporation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child into domestic Irish law so that every public servant who makes a decision has to make sure that it’s in compliance with children’s rights. I think that’s the only way forward. So that is the long-term goal every decision, whether that’s in agriculture or housing or local authority or education, everybody’s thinking about children’s rights all the time, and if they don’t think about it and they can’t prove it, then there could be a lawsuit. So, we’ve a lot of work to do to make that happen. It’s been done in Scotland. It’s been done in South Africa. It’s been done in Sweden. We’d like Ireland to be among the first European countries to make it happen. And I think that’s when you really will see the State properly step up and help those children who are vulnerable so that every child is considered. That’s how you get proper inclusion.

Kai: Yes, yeah, I agree.

Kai: As the Ombudsman for children. What do you think are the critical issues in our care system that the government must prioritise in the next year?

Niall: Within the care system, we need more foster care. We need to get that. And then I think we really have to grapple with the special care and the special emergency accommodation situation. We need to acknowledge that you cannot be outsourcing that all the time. We need to provide safe, secure, reliable services for those children, and I think that needs to be done through engaging with the NGO and the voluntary sector, which is part of the strategic plan of TUSLA – to increase the number of publicly run residential units for children in care. So yeah, I think that’s where we really need to focus.

Kai: Yeah. And like looking at emergency arrangements at the moment for a child, you know, I had a few different experiences in a few different homes and stuff as a child and that was difficult enough. But I spent over a year in homeless services, and I just got a place there in December and I didn’t realise how much stability would make such a difference in my life. Everything has become so much easier to handle. I’m getting up in a better mood. I’m coming home in a better mood. I’m looking after myself better and stuff, so I didn’t realise. I knew stability was important. I did, but I didn’t realise what a key role it plays. So, for a child going through a traumatic time already and then being put in hotels or being put in emergency arrangements like, I can’t imagine you know how difficult that is.

Niall: I mean, it’s certainly the very least you could hope for is you don’t add to the trauma of a child.

Jeepers well done to you Kai. Oh my God, that’s horrible that you had to go through that.

Kai: It wasn’t the best situation now I will say. And sure, with the housing crisis and the rental crisis anyway, it’s just absolutely impossible . You know, there’s people still in their 30s and 40s living at home, and if you don’t have the support network that your peers have then your kind of at a disadvantage.

Niall: It’s a secure place where you are now?

Kai: Yeah, yeah, so thank God. I kind of have just a bit of stability now, which it does, it makes all the difference, you know, like in every aspect, even my education.

Niall: Great. Well done.

Kai: So, in the programme for government, there’s a commitment to develop a long-term vision for how the care system will operate in the future. What would your long-term vision for the care system be?

Niall: Well, I think if we start with foster care, we need to make sure that the foster families are properly supported. That kinship care is properly supported. That finance is not an issue. You know we should be saying. ‘We are so delighted you’re helping us to provide for these children that we will make your life as easy as possible. You don’t have to fight for everything. We’re not going to argue over everything.’ Make things as smooth as possible for that big army because you know nearly 6000 children are cared for, by probably 5000 families, something like. That’s hugely important.

And then, and at the more severe stages, where we took away high support care for children, I think we need to reinstate those placements as well as special care beds. We need to provide a more rounded provision for those children who are a little bit more complicated, and we need to take it seriously. These children are in our care. We have a situation at the moment where TUSLA’s statutory obligation is to provide for these children, to go to the High Court and get a court care order to bring those children in, but then they can’t provide them with the right placement. And you know that is the definition of insanity. You know, you’re legally obliged. You spend tens of thousands of euros to go to the High Court, you get the care order, and then the child stays in unstable, emergency accommodation.

I think to be fair, the strategy and the plan is there. We need to make it happen and the government needs to provide the opportunities, and that could mean looking at compulsory orders and purchasing, maybe looking at different ways of providing accommodation. You know different ways of doing things.

And then the last piece for me would always be, to make sure aftercare is fully supported as well. You know that’s crucial. And again, we had plans for local authorities to be helping children coming out of care at 18 years of age into their services. We need to make sure that happens.

Kai: How do you think we can improve the outcomes for young care-experienced people transitioning to adulthood?

Niall: We need to acknowledge that we need to provide support and assistance, whether it’s shared accommodation, whether it’s, you know small studio type accommodation, but just we need to see a new way of doing that and making it happen. And again, we’re not talking massive numbers either. You know, we need to get those units up and running in a way that’s safe and secure and provide them for those in aftercare, whether they’re in education or not. We need to be providing for care-experienced youth. Education is great and we’re delighted to get more in there. The more the better, however, that does not abdicate our responsibility for those not going on to further education.

Kai: Like if you look at like, people turned 18 who are living with their family. A lot of them will take a gap year to go travelling. A lot of them will stay at home because they can’t rent somewhere. A lot of them will have their parents help fund somewhere to live. And the age of moving out of home is going up and up and up, but if you’ve grown up in, say, residential care, you know, it is kind of, it is scary. That kind of thought process is there, that one day you’re being staffed 24/7 and then the next day you’re an adult, and you don’t have the support of having family and affordable housing.

Niall: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So, we need to recognise that and just make a commitment to it.

Kai: Do you have any messages or advice for care-experienced people in care or in aftercare?

Niall: Wow, who am I to give advice?

There are good people out there that will help you, but you need to know where to ask, and EPIC is probably a starting point. That’s probably the best I could say at this point. Because I think, I could probably gain more advice from care-experienced children than I can give them. And if our office can help in any way, we’d be delighted to help. Yeah.

Kai: Brilliant. Anything else you’d like to add to any of the questions or in general?

Niall: Congratulations to you and all involved in Care Day. I hope it’s a brilliant day. I’m so delighted to see it spreading. You know, from about 40 people at the first day out it’s great to see you taking it in so many different directions all over the country and internationally. It’s a wonderful thing to see. And again, it’s that idea that we wanted to highlight. There’s lots of great care-experienced kids doing great stuff and thriving and making the best and we don’t hear enough from them.

Kai: I think so. There is a lot of stigma about growing up in the care system, but I think Care Day is a great day for the younger people in care and for young adults who have left care, that kind of connection with others. You’re not a statistic. You’re just as well able and deserving as everyone else. So, I think Care Day is a great day to kind of show that and to show that, you know, we’re all capable and that we’re not our care experience.

Niall: Fantastic. Great, listen, that’s it, I can’t top that. Well done. Well done. Well done.