This document summarizes a study on the implementation of recommendations from five reports of inquiries into failures in child protection in Ireland between 1993 and 2010. The study developed a CLEAR template to help make recommendations more measurable and feasible to implement. The template emphasizes that recommendations should be clear, limited in number, evidence-based, assign responsibility, and be amenable to review. It is meant to address issues like repetitive and aspirational recommendations as well as lack of stakeholder input that limited implementation in past reports.

1. Helen Buckley
Caroline O’Nolan
School of Social Work and Social Policy
Trinity College Dublin

2.  Research commissioned by the Department of
Children and Youth Affairs and conducted in
2012-13
 Objective: To study recommendations from 5
specific reports of inquiries into child
protection failures (1993-2010) and ascertain
degree of implementation
 Develop a template for future
recommendations

3.  Literature and Policy Review
 Detailed study of 5 reports of inquiries
 Establish list and timeline of all published
inquiries/reviews of CP services
 Semi-structured (elite) interviews (21)
 Consultation with stakeholders (21)

4.  (Published)Inquiries initiated in response to
perceived crisis
 29 published inquiries and reviews over 20
years
 Wide range of failures investigated:
 Intra-familial abuse
 Institutional abuse
 Diocesan clerical abuse
 551 recommendations in total

5.  ‘that’s life…that’s just life’
 Political reality
 Original report ‘game-changer’
 Way of accessing resources
 Very difficult for staff ‘caught up’ in the
process
 Not always conducive to learning
 Scope for improvement

6.  Many of the issues underpinning recommendations
had already been identified by policy makers and
had in many cases been planned and may have
stalled due to lack of funding
 Too numerous
 Some were predictable
 Some repetitive (infers lack of change)
 Some considered too aspirational
 Reflected agendas of panel members
 Potential for consultation

7.  ‘You can seal it in a brown envelope before you start
and know that inter-agency cooperation will come
up, probably something to do with adherence to
policy and procedure, and all these predictable
things, the quality of records and so on … You can
bet your bottom dollar that they will come out.’

8.  Improved vigilance and identification of
children at risk
 Better inter-agency co-operation
 Improved record keeping and exchange of
information
 Protocols for child protection conference
 Training
 Child-centeredness
 Children’s rights

9.  Most implemented at least to some degree
 Implementation of recommendations with a
local rather than national focus more difficult
to measure
 Implementation was often obscured by other
developments at the time
 Distinction between addressing and
implementing recommendations
 Pressure for implementation tended to come
from politicians in the opposition parties

10.  Considered far more influential than empirical
research because of public awareness- yet not real
drivers of change
 Implications?
 Recommendations fatigue- diminishing returns
 Critical mass reached
 Internal QA mechanisms providing greater
transparency & promoting higher standards- less need
for inquiries
 Effective reforms need local knowledge and
professional ‘buy-in’
 Process of developing recommendations needs to
provide for collaboration with key stakeholders
 Shift in focus to learning

11.  ‘A very good […] and very knowledgeable … but when […] had
[their] analysis done and began working on recommendations, the
absolute poverty of [their] understanding of management became
absolutely crystal clear because the consequences of what was
recommended were so inconsistent with any sound management
practice that it was completely undermining the report … You get
somebody at one level from the professional child care perspective
talking about interdisciplinary and inter-agency collaboration and
all of that and then coming with recommendations that are much
more akin to silos … The actual experience of having being
involved in statutory child protection and the actual experience of
managing within a statutory context is starkly absent from most
of the inquiries, it seems to me.’

12. Establish advisory group
↓
Invite written submissions
↓
Conduct review and draft recommendations
↓
Stakeholder seminar
↓
Convene workshops
↓
Briefings

13.  Case for change
 Learning oriented
 Evidence based
 Assignment of responsibility
 Review – written in a manner which facilitates
review

14.  Drawing on evidence, identify the issues that
need change
 Outline the consequences of no change
 Contextualise it in current policy to show the
level of congruence

15.  Deficits are not necessarily due to lack of
training but to inadequate information or
guidance
 Promote additional research and practice
guidance
 Evidence of good practice
 Messages for practice elaborated in a separate
section

16.  Evidence of deficits in policy or practice
 Need to demonstrate knowledge of the context
in which recommendations are to be
implemented
 Recommendations should only be made if
evidence exists to show that their
implementation will effectively address and
remediate the deficits identified by the report

17.  Specify:
 Discipline
 Directorate
 Organisation
 Leader to coordinate and oversee implementation

18.  The implementation of recommendations
should be amenable to review
 Should be possible to link them to regulatory
processes such as HIQA standards
 Any review should capture the more nuanced
aspects of child protection practice
 Multi method approach to auditing will be
required

19.  Recommendations should be fewer in number
and should be the result of a collaborative and
consultative process,
 A fresh approach should provide clarity and
ensure that recommendations are well
grounded, more feasible and cost effective
 The CLEAR template should get over the
difficulty of measuring outcomes in an area
that involves the exercise of professional
judgement.