Guidelines on the use of restraint on young people in schools fall short of what is needed to protect children, several senior experts have said.
The Special Rapporteur on Child Protection and the Children’s Ombudsman have said the guidelines need to be changed to promote a more “child-centred” system, in particular to protect children with special educational needs.
In December, the Department of Education published new guidelines on the use of restraint on children in Irish schools.
This includes a reporting mechanism that will come into force in September, where incidents of restraint being used will have to be reported to the National Council for Special Education.
The guidelines state that seclusion is “inappropriate” and should not be used in schools, and while restraint may be needed as “a last resort”, particularly where there is a risk to someone’s physical safety, the Department’s “strong ambition” is to phase out the use of restraint in schools.
AsIam and Inclusion Ireland have said some elements of the guidelines are welcome, such as the ban on seclusion.
At an event held in Dublin by the two advocacy groups, Special Rapporteur on Child Protection Caoilfhionn Gallagher KC said that restraint being used as a last resort should move from being accepted in principle to put into practice.
“In my view, the view as I understand it, of the Ombudsman and the view of AsIAm and Inclusion Island, is that the guidelines as currently constituted fall short of what is needed, and do not provide that protection that children need,” Ms Gallagher KC said.
“So we have a lot to do in a short space of time before we hit September, and that’s why having this conversation just before there is a new minister is so critical.”
She also raised concerns about the NCSE not having the powers to investigate serious incidents when they occur.
“This could, remarkably, result in a situation where at local level, information is known about an instance, which might be very serious and may have resulted in physical injury, and you have generic information provided to the national level body, but the national level body has no way of knowing who the child is, who the staff member is.
The guidelines state that seclusion is ‘inappropriate’ and should not be used in schools (Danny Lawson/PA)
“If this is a staff member who’s done it multiple times with multiple children, there’s no way of knowing that.”
She said that in other settings such as prisons, hospitals and residential care settings, there is significant oversight and robust reporting mechanisms for incidents.
“Why are schools different? Because we’re talking about restraint, whether it’s applied by a member of teaching staff, or whether it’s applied by a Garda, or whether it’s applied by a prison officer, (it) can have those same devastating results.”
Speaking at the same event, Ombudsman for Children Dr Niall Muldoon quoted Martin Luther King who said “social progress never rolls in on the ways of inevitability”.
“‘Time itself becomes an ally of the primitive forces of social stagnation’.”
He said that advocacy groups, parents of children with special educational needs and the vast majority of educators are trying to make a difference, “but somebody somewhere is slow to allow safe, appropriate and proportionate guidelines to be developed which are child-centred”.
“Each year, we receive complaints from parents about harm by their children as a result of use of seclusion and restraint, and oftentimes those parents are left unaware that these incidents have occurred, and as many of their children may be non verbal, its use only comes to light when harm has been done. That’s not a child-centred system.
“If a child falls in the playground and cuts themselves, there is a report made somewhere. There’s a report made up the line in case they’re sued.
“You cannot possibly have restraint or seclusion without the parents being informed immediately. That’s not child-centred. That’s not even human-centred.”
He added: “Our view is that the current complaints process is not sufficiently robust to adequately deal with the matter of restraint against a child in a crisis situation. In our letter to the Department previously, we recommended inserting more detailed information in the guidance about how schools should approach the examination and investigation of complaints.”
Parent Kevin McGowan, of the advocacy group Chasing Justice, said that when it comes to child protection, “the current system is broken”.
He said the system does look to log the actions of the adult taken before the behaviour took place, and whether there was an action that triggered the child.
“There is no focus on whether those triggers happened in the room. The questions we have is ‘what triggered it?’”
Assistant Chief Inspector at Department of Education Brendan Doody said the Department was satisfied that the guidelines sufficiently protect and take account of the rights of the child, but added that this did not mean it was “the perfect version that will apply from here ad infinitum”.
Mr Doody said the reporting requirement of use of restraint applies to all children and not just children with special educational needs.
He said the reporting requirement will apply from September to give time for one-day training of school staff, but emphasised they are not being trained to restrain young people.
“So the idea here is that the three key words that are underpinned by entirety of the document – prevention, early intervention, de-escalation – that we build capacity of all and sundry working in the student system so that they are able to de-escalate, so that they are able to apply the most beneficial preventative measures, so that they are able to intervene, to recognise the triggers, to ensure that actually restraint isn’t required as a measure.”
He said that currently, the Department of Education has no official data to inform how frequently restraint is used in schools.
He said that the Department expects the data being collected from incidents being reported from September to inform future guidelines.
“We have individual contact with parents, parent groups, with the advocacy groups, and they make us aware of examples, and they’re very awful examples, really, really awful examples that some children have experienced in school and their parents have experienced in challenging in engaging with the school system. All of that needs to be improved.”