Minister for Health Mary Harney was urged last night to immediately instigate an independent inquiry into the practices of the Health Service Executive (HSE)North Eastern Area after it took another child with an intellectual disability into care after the parents sought its assistance.
It emerged yesterday that a boy fostered by Navan couple Bernard and Jacqueline Mohan for the past 13 years was taken back into care in December by the former North Eastern Health Board after the couple appealed to the health board for extra supports to help them cope with the child's special needs.
"I rang them and said this is a crisis situation and I need respite help. And this is the help they provided," Mrs Mohan explained yesterday.
She said her family were not consulted before the child was taken from them. He went as normal to his special school on December 3rd last and was taken into care later in the day without returning home.
"We are being punished for asking for help," Mrs Mohan said.
"There is a huge sense of loss in our family now. It's like a bereavement only it's worse because there's no closure," she added.
The case mirrors that of the O'Hara family from Kells who, when they complained to the same health board about lack of support services for their children, four of whom are autistic, had their five boys taken into care.
After much controversy and court hearings earlier this month, their children were returned to them.
Mrs Mohan said that over the years she had sought respite care for her foster son, who has a moderate to severe learning disability, but very little was provided by the health board. "There were also a lot of things the health board's own psychologists said should be done over the years but were never done."
The first she knew of the boy being taken into care was on December 3rd at 2.30pm when the health board phoned to tell her a social worker would collect some of his things. "At that stage we realised he wasn't coming home."
After he was taken into care, the boy was moved several times between respite centres and even spent a night in a B&B, his foster mother claimed. He is now in a unit which provides him with excellent care, according to Mrs Mohan, but she feels he is missing out on a family environment. The Mohans have two older sons, who their mother says are brokenhearted over what has happened.
She feels after years of providing foster care her efforts have been thrown back in her face.
In a statement the HSE North Eastern Area said it could not comment on an individual case. But it said the statutory duty of the HSE under the Child Care Act 1991 was to ensure that the welfare of children in care is protected at all times.
Last night Labour TD Kathleen Lynch said the news that another child with a disability has been taken into care by the HSE North Eastern Area without any notice or discussion with his family would strike fear into the hearts of families across the State.
"The effects on children are terrorising, and the effects on families are traumatic beyond belief," she said.She called on Ms Harney to instigate an independent inquiry into the practices and procedures of the HSE in this area.