About Safeguarding Ireland

Our Background

Safeguarding Ireland was established to promote
safeguarding of adults who may be vulnerable, protect
them from all forms of abuse by persons, organisations
and institutions and develop a national plan for promoting
their welfare. This will be achieved by promoting
inter-sectoral collaboration, developing public and
professional awareness and education, and undertaking
research to inform policy, practice and legislation in the
Republic of Ireland.

Safeguarding Ireland is a registered charity: RCN 20204851.

Adult safeguarding issues in Ireland

Sadly, examples of adult safeguarding issues occur in Ireland on a daily basis. Some are the subject of close media scrutiny, others occur in the privacy of a person’s own home or within one of Ireland’s health and social care services. Abuse against those who are vulnerable can be perpetrated by a range of people, from strangers to a family member.

Patricia Rickard-Clarke,
Independent Chairperson

Safeguarding Ireland has now been established (through a company limited by guarantee – National Safeguarding Ireland), with the support of its main funder the HSE, to provide a strong governance base and oversight structure for all future inter-sectoral work relating to safeguarding of vulnerable adults spending the envisaged introduction of adult safeguarding legislation by 2025. It also has responsibility for developing a new Strategic Plan to build on the Strategic Plan first developed through the loosely based National Safeguarding Committee (2015-2019).

Safeguarding Ireland Board Members

Ms. Patricia Rickard-Clarke – Chair
Mr. David Byrne – Former Attorney General and former European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Protection
Mr. Colm Nolan – Society of Financial Planners Ireland
Ms. Annmarie O’Connor – Former Business Manager, Money and Budgeting Service (MABS)
Ms. Louise O’Mahony – Head of Sustainable Banking, Banking & Payments Federation Ireland
(BPFI)
Ms. Nora Owen – Former Minister for Justice
Professor Amanda Phelan – Professor in Trinity College Dublin
Mr. Phelim Quinn – Former CEO Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA)
Mr. Mervyn Taylor – Former Executive Director of SAGE Advocacy

Attendees:

General Manager of HSE National Safeguarding Office
HSE Principal Social Worker representing Safeguarding and Protection Teams
Safeguarding Ireland, Programme Manager
Cavanagh Communications (Public Awareness)

In a Red C Poll commissioned by Safeguarding Ireland, half of the respondents reported that a vulnerable adult close to them had experienced abuse. This should not be acceptable in any society and certainly not in a developed democracy such as Ireland.

Further Aims

Objects, incidental and ancillary to the attainment of the Main Objective, are to do the following for the benefit of adults in the Republic of Ireland who may be vulnerable:

(a) To raise public understanding of attitudes, behaviours, circumstances and systems that create vulnerability that may result in abuse and that may require a safeguarding response.

(b) To promote the protection and rights of people who may be vulnerable by encouraging organisations and services to recognise, prevent and deal with exploitation and abuse effectively.

(c) To inform and influence Government policy and legislation to safeguard the rights of people who may be vulnerable.

Annual
Reports

2021 Annual Report

2020 Annual Report

2019 Annual Report

Financial Statements

2020 Financial Statements

2019 Financial Statements

Memorandum of
Association

Safeguarding Ireland Memorandum of Association

Organisations represented on the

National Safeguarding Advisory Committee