Vetting delays standing in the way of 11 new staff at OCIL, Tullamore

Garda vetting delays are stopping the Offaly Centre for Independent Living (OCIL) from hiring an additional eleven staff members, the Offaly Independent has learned.

Speaking today (Monday) Fianna Fail TD Barry Cowen said delays of up to five and a half months are standing in the way of the centre that works to empower people with disabilities by providing a personal assistant service taking on the new staff.

“The Garda vetting system is extremely important and necessary but the government has failed to put in place the necessary resources to ensure it works to support organisations like OCIL and not effectively against them,” Deputy Cowen said, adding that his party suggested that the present problems could happen in the Dail last year.

“When the National Vetting Bureau legislation to put the current Garda vetting system on a statutory basis was going through the Dáil we said that an expansion of information in the system would inevitably place a strain on the resources of the Vetting Bureau,” he said.

“We urged that sufficient resources be committed to the vetting process to ensure that it is rigorously undertaken with reasonable processing times.'

Deputy Cowen said his plan now is to raise the issue with the government as a matter of urgency.

“The Offaly Centre for Independent Living is doing very important work and actually saving the local health services a huge amount of money by helping people to live independently and stay out of long-term care facilities,” he said.

'OCIL has gone from strength to strength since it was founded by Michael Nestor in the 1990s and they should be able to increase the level of support they can offer without undue delays in Garda vetting.”