Private companies continue to be paid millions of euros to house vulnerable children in State care in unregulated emergency accommodation, new figures from Tusla, the child and family agency, show.
Fifteen companies shared €56 million in payments from Tusla last year to run unregulated accommodation, known as special emergency arrangements.
Children are often put into rented apartments or houses, bed and breakfasts and hotel rooms, supervised by staff from private companies.
The lack of space in regulated group homes for children in care and a shortage of foster carers means Tusla has increasingly relied on this emergency accommodation. There were 158 children in State care living in these emergency arrangements at the start of February.
One company, Baig & Mirza Health Services, was paid €16.5 million by Tusla last year. The company is owned by two men, Muhammad Usman Baig (40) and Farhan Mirza (41), who are both based in Dublin.
Company accounts show the firm made a profit of €3 million in 2023, on the back of nearly €13 million it received from Tusla to run emergency accommodation. A separate property company owned by the pair was paid €600,000 by Tusla last year.
The second highest paid provider of emergency accommodation was Comet Care Ltd, who were paid €7.5 million by Tusla last year.
One of its owners and directors, Louis O’Moore (43), from Malahide, Dublin, has worked in the residential care sector for several years.
Mr O’Moore is listed as head of operations at Daffodil Care, a company contracted by Tusla to run regulated group homes for children in care.
He also sits on the board of Social Care Ireland, an industry group for the social care sector. Records show Comet Care Ltd was set up in 2021.
Another company running emergency accommodation, Tender Touch Services, was paid €5.9 million by Tusla last year. The firm is run by Sylverline Chikwe (46), from Newbridge, Co Kildare. It reported a profit of €1 million in 2023.
The figures detailing the payments made by Tusla were released to The Irish Times, following a request made under the Freedom of Information Act.
Several of the companies are franchise operations under the Kare Plus group umbrella, who are mainly involved in providing home care and nursing services.
Jonah Ramasia (41), a doctor, is the managing director of Kare Plus South Cork. His company, Superior Health Ltd, was paid €4.9 million by Tusla last year, to run special emergency arrangements.
Dr Ramasia runs the business with Gloria Ramasia (33), who is an accountant. The pair list a home address in Co Limerick on company accounts.
The fifth highest paid company, Victoria Healthcare Organisation, received €4.2 million in payments from Tusla last year. Samson Aba (49), who lives in Skibbereen, Cork, owns the company.
Rev John Ardis, a Church of Ireland priest in Skibbereen, is also listed as a director. When contacted, Rev Ardis said he had no day-to-day involvement in the company beyond his role as a director. The company’s website states it provides home care and respite care and also sells wheelchairs online.
Whisbay Ltd, operating as Kare Plus Dublin city north, was paid €3.7 million to manage emergency accommodation for young people in State care.
The company’s directors are David Toal (52) and Brian Toal (45), who both have addresses in Castleknock, Dublin.
David Toal is listed as the managing director of the company, having previously worked as a banker in KBC Bank for 10 years. The firm made €1.3 million in profit in 2023, with the two directors sharing €300,000 in fees and remuneration.
One company run by an evangelical pastor, Good People Homecare Ltd, received €1.9 million in payments from Tusla last year, down from the €5.3 million it received in 2023. The company primarily provides agency staff to oversee emergency accommodation.
Good People is run by Gerard Chimbganda (50), an evangelical pastor from Zimbabwe, who is a senior figure in Praise Tabernacle AFM, an international Pentecostal church in north inner-city Dublin. The company had €4.3 million in assets in 2023, according to filed accounts.
Mr Chimbganda said the company maintained a “strict separation between religious practices and the care we provide to children”, which was “secular, inclusive and attuned to the diverse backgrounds and needs of the children we serve”.
“While we hold this separation in our operational practices, it’s important to acknowledge that our services are motivated by a profound principle of love, guided by the teachings of Jesus Christ,” he said.
The company was also paid €570,000 to run accommodation for Ukrainian refugees in the first three quarters of last year, according to Department of Integration records.
Adeniyi Ademola (37), a nurse, is the managing director and owner of Clarion Healthcare, which received €3.7 million from Tusla to run emergency accommodation last year. Financial accounts filed recently show the company made a profit of €700,000.
Concerns were previously raised by Tusla social workers about young people in accommodation run by Clarion smoking “joints”.
Further emails from Tusla to the company around the same time criticised the fact Clarion had failed to address “obvious health and safety hazards” at one property.
Reign Healthcare, a company run by Tafadzwa Vambe (47) and Tariro Taruvinga (43), from Portarlington, Co Laois, was paid €1.7 million in 2024. The figures are a sharp drop on the €5.4 million the company was paid by Tusla in 2023.
A complaint was previously made about Reign Healthcare allegedly accommodating two girls in care in a house that was “unfit for purpose”. The complaint was made to Tusla in late 2022 by another organisation working in the care sector. It claimed the emergency placement did not appear to be appropriately staffed, with care workers having “poor English and communication skills”.
In a statement, Mr Vambe said Reign Healthcare had at one point run a dozen emergency placements.
“However, since 2023, Tusla has ceased allocating young persons to our care without providing any clear reasoning, despite our repeated attempts to engage with them for clarification,” he said.
Late last year the company “successfully registered two houses” with Tusla, but children had not yet been placed into the accommodation, he said. “As we stand now, we are ready to take on any young person in need of care” he said.
The majority of children placed in unregulated accommodation are young asylum seekers who arrived in the Republic without guardians. Of the 158 young people accommodated in special emergency arrangements by Tusla at the start of February, some 117 were underage asylum seekers.
“To manage the increase in demand for placements for separated children seeking international protection, Tusla has increased its placement capacity and established new accommodation centres for unaccompanied minors,” a Tusla spokesman said.
The agency had successfully reduced the number of other children in the care system living in emergency accommodation, down from a high point of 72 in March 2023 to 41 this February, he said.
Efforts were made to move young people out of special emergency arrangements into regulated care settings, such as group homes or foster care “as soon as possible”, the spokesman said.
