THE GRANADA Institute in Dublin, which treats people who sexually abused children, is to close. While it was best known for treating clerical child sex offenders, in more recent years between 80 per cent and 90 per cent of its clients have been lay people.
The institute is to begin winding down at the end of this month, ceasing the provision of services altogether by the end of December.
Run by the St John of God Brothers, it is currently treating fewer than 20 clients, according to its director of clinical services, Dr Joseph Duffy. He said it intends completing existing contracts with the HSE, the Probation Service and the Irish Prison Service.
Granada chief executive Monica Mooney said the institute has recently been run at a loss of €250,000 per annum while this year the loss would be €600,000. The situation was “unsustainable financially”, she said, and had been dependent on “the benevolence of the order [of St John of God]”.
Speaking yesterday Dr Duffy said that, despite speculation that closure of the institute was imminent since the announcement in March 2010 that it was no longer accepting referrals, the decision to close was only made when its board met yesterday.
He said that a review of its services in the context of best practice had begun in the first quarter of 2009.
It was felt that “if we were to recommence taking referrals, they would have to be directed through the HSE or the proposed new dedicated child protection agency which would be independent of the HSE,” he said. But with the Government decision to create this agency still to be made and the time it would then take to set it up, “we could not continue funding the service for an indeterminate period”, he said.
Ms Mooney said closure was not precipitated by criticisms of its services in the Murphy Commission report, published in November 2009. It investigated the handling of clerical child sex abuse allegations by church and State authorities in the Dublin archdiocese. Many of the priests investigated had attended the institute.
Referring to “the superb work and commitment over the years” at the institute, Ms Mooney said that what they wanted was “to change the model where best practice is concerned and provide a service with proper funding”.
Subsequent to the Murphy report, an independent review of its services was commissioned by the Granada Institute itself last year. It too was critical of services provided.
A total of 11 staff at the institute face redundancy, four of them support staff with the rest clinicians.
Dr Duffy hoped redeployment might be possible but felt this could be inhibited by the current moratorium on public service employment.
