Centre for troubled teenage boys to reopen in Limerick

Staff recruitmentA €5 million centre for disturbed teenage boys that has been operational for just seven months in the past four years due to staffing difficulties is to reopen next month.

In April 2004, the Health Service Executive (HSE) shut down Coovagh House in Limerick due to a staffing crisis.

The move to shut down the special care unit and relocate two boys in the centre's care was the latest setback to Coovagh House, which remained unoccupied for one year after its completion in 2002 due to a shortage of staff.

Now the HSE has confirmed that referrals to allow the reopening of the centre in December will begin later this month with 32 of the 46 staff in place.

This follows a recruitment campaign that has been ongoing for more than a year.

"The remainder of staff are being processed and it is anticipated that subject to satisfactory clearances, they will commence shortly," a spokesman said.

He said the centre's reopening was conditional on the appointment of a senior clinical psychologist and of a management advisory committee, and appointments for both were currently being processed.

The HSE has already missed a proposed reopening date of last May for the centre, which costs €1.8 million a year to run.

Over the past four years, the HSE has confirmed it has spent €230,609 in various recruitment campaigns - including a recruitment drive in Canada last year - to staff the unit.

Labour Party health spokeswoman Liz McManus said yesterday: "I welcome that at long last the HSE is getting its act together on this centre, but anecdotal evidence from around the country suggests that these units are not being used anywhere near their capacity and not reaching the children at risk that they are supposed to be caring for.

"So there are big questions as to whether we are getting realistic use of these centres and under the new system the HSE is stripped of accountability, making it impossible to get answers at a local level."

Limerick West deputy Dan Neville (FG) yesterday welcomed the proposed reopening of Coovagh House. "There is an urgent need for such a facility for children out of control in the area who are currently being inappropriately placed in psychiatric units or prison," he said.

The centre - along with two others, in Dublin and Cork - was established by the Government on foot of a High Court order by Mr Justice Peter Kelly in 2000, compelling the State to provide such care due to there being no secure accommodation for the out-of-control teenagers that were coming before him.

The Coovagh centre is located on the grounds of St Joseph's psychiatric hospital and contained within a 4.3m (14ft) high perimeter wall. The centre comprises a residential centre, a school, an administration building and sports facilities including a medium-sized soccer pitch, an indoor basketball court and a gym.

The centre is to cater for troubled boys aged 11-17 from the south, southeast and midwest. Boys can be admitted to Coovagh House only through a court order, and the basic criteria for admission is that the young person has a history of absconding from other residential units and represents a serious risk to themselves or others.