Tanya Ward, chief executive of the Children Rights Alliance has expressed her shock that children remain unaccounted for by Tusla.
“We understand from Tusla is that some of these young people arrived in the country and moved on very quickly to be joined by their families, but some children, there is a real fear that there is a risk of exploitation and some of the worst forms of exploitation, sexual exploitation and prostitution,” she told RTÉ radio’s Morning Ireland.
“This goes to the heart of what does the State response look like for children who arrive in this country seeking protection when they are here without their parents.”
Ms Ward explained that the backgrounds of the unaccounted for children covered a wide spectrum, but that some were all very vulnerable.
“Sometimes they are sent here because the parents have been involved in politics, and they're afraid of reprisals.
"At the other end of the spectrum, there are young people who are 15, 16, 17 coming from countries like Afghanistan, where there's been an enormous amount of destabilisation because of the Taliban, and they've been living on their own for a long period of time, and they arrive in the State seeking protection.
“Tusla has a mammoth task to try to respond to the real diversity of these children, because, always the preferred option is to put children in foster care.
"But if you have a young person who has been living on their own for several years, you have to come up with a different type of solution for that young person.”
Tusla’s overall policy needed to be looked at because the challenges it was facing were unprecedented, said Ms Ward.
“For the numbers of children arriving in the country on their own Tusla is really the last safety net for children and young people and their policies at this point in time, don't give them the reach and the scope in terms of how to resolve some of the problems these young people are facing.
“But the other side of it is the accommodation crisis that Tusla is experiencing now. It concerns me when I hear social workers are frantically looking for accommodation, when they should be focused on developing care plans and working with young people directly.”
Ms Ward said that in other countries the local municipality or local authority would be sourcing accommodation.
“It wouldn't just land on the door of Tusla, the child and family agency. And I think here we need to see a real cross-government approach.
"We can't just have one agency working in a very siloed approach. We have to see a huge involvement with other government department partners in this area.”
