Updated: 4pm
The Minister of State for Disabilities has been told of a lack of communication with vulnerable residents of the Ard Greine Court facility in Stranorlar.
As plans continue to close down the centre and move residents to ‘de-congregated’ settings around the county, it’s claimed that families and residents are not being adequately consulted.
The Ard Gréine Court in Stranorlar campus is the same campus where a now-deceased resident was found to have carried out sustained sexual abuse of intellectually disabled residents over a period of 13 years. The resident was given the pseudonym Brandon in a report, published last year, which gave details of 108 acts of sexual abuse on upwards of 18 residents.
Deputy Thomas Pringle said: “It is hard to believe that after all that has happened that the HSE will still behave in this way.”
Speaking in the Dáil on Tuesday, he said: “Some residents are quite elderly and Ard Gréine is their home, but the HSE doesn’t recognise that. Once again they decide and everyone has to accept.
“The brother of one resident said, ‘after Brandon they said it would all be person-centred. But nothing has changed. It’s the same old, same old, covering their tracks, talking down to us’.
“Apparently the HSE have said that ‘each resident will be at the centre of the decision-making process for their move.’ No one involved with Brandon believes that unfortunately,” the deputy said.
Deputy Pringle told Minister of State for Disabilities Anne Rabbitte that families of residents at Ard Gréine Court have faith in her, but they have been let down by the HSE.
“Throughout the whole time the HSE has only been concerned with containing the Brandon issue. They closed ranks at every opportunity. That went right up to HQ within the HSE as well, and there is no way that this is only a Donegal issue. I believe that the HSE at all levels nationally have questions to answer on this issue as well. Both Brandon and all the residents have been let down by the HSE and the Department of Health,” he said.
The HSE has since responded to say that “Family Information Sessions to communicate and consult on the decongregation process and plans for Ard Greine Court took place in April 2023 and were attended by multidisciplinary staff members and managers. Further communications and engagements will be undertaken ongoing as agreed by each resident.”
The current planned timeframe for completion of the Ard Greine Court decongregation will be up to 3 years from now.
Minister Rabbitte said she is developing a safeguarding assurance exercise to be undertaken by an independent expert which would build on improvements in safeguarding under way in CHO1. She said her hope is to ensure the voices of residents and their families, as well as those working in the area, contribute to the ongoing effort to strengthen safeguarding policy and practice, and her aim is to have it set up and running by the end of June.
The minister said families need to be reassured that their loved ones are in a safe environment and said safeguarding is a priority for her.
Deputy Pringle thanked the minister for her interventions and said: “This review group that you’re putting in place needs to work and needs to work very well and it needs to work for Donegal but also for the whole country because there’s big problems right the whole way through, right up to the top in the HSE as well and that has to be addressed too.”
Full statement from the HSE:
Community Healthcare Cavan, Donegal, Leitrim, Monaghan, Sligo (CH CDLMS) continues to progress decongregation across a number of services including Ard Greine Court, Donegal. The decongregation programme, in place across the country as well as in CH CDLMS, is being undertaken in line with the recommendations from the Time to Move on from Congregated Settings – A Strategy for Community Inclusion report.
This 2011 report and its recommendations were adopted as national HSE policy. The report identified that over 4,000 people with disabilities in Ireland were living in congregated type settings, defined as, “where ten or more people reside in a single living unit or are campus-based”. Ard Greine Court in Donegal, established in 2008, is identified as a campus based setting. It is a Government and HSE priority to ensure that all residents in existing congregated settings are actively supported to move into homes in the community, of no more than four persons, with person-centred support that will enable them to lead the life of their choice and participate as equal citizens in their local community.
Family Information Sessions to communicate and consult on the decongregation process and plans for Ard Greine Court took place in April 2023 and were attended by multidisciplinary staff members and managers. Further communications and engagements will be undertaken ongoing as agreed by each resident. The CH CDLMS experience of previous and ongoing decongregation processes indicates that the current planned timeframe for completion of the Ard Greine Court decongregation will be up to 3 years from now.
The staff and management of Ard Greine Court, the Disability Services Management Team and the CH CDLMS Executive Management Team are totally committed to ensuring that all actions taken to support residents in the decongregation process will protect their fundamental rights.
