From Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth
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The Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, Roderic O’Gorman, today announced the appointment by the government of Ms Caoilfhionn Gallagher KC as Special Rapporteur on Child Protection for a three-year term.
The Minister welcomed Ms Gallagher to the role and said:
“Caoilfhionn is an international human rights lawyer and barrister, with a wealth of expertise in the areas of children’s rights and child welfare and protection. I look forward to working with her during her term."
The appointment follows an open competition run by the Public Appointments Service (PAS). Speaking today, Ms Gallagher said:
“This is a critical time for children’s rights and child protection in Ireland. There are many pressing and urgent challenges, some of which have been highlighted by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child in the days leading up to my appointment. This independent role is a vital one, and I look forward to working with the government, specialist organisations and children and young people during my term to meet my mandate.”
Ms Gallagher works as an international human rights lawyer and barrister, based in Doughty Street Chambers, London. She has acted in many of the leading children’s rights cases before United Nations bodies, the European Court of Human Rights and courts in the UK and other jurisdictions. She also sits part-time as a Coroner, responsible for undertaking investigations into suspicious child deaths, and she was appointed as a national reviewer for the Child Safeguarding Review Panel for England and Wales from 2019-2021, a role requiring the investigation of systemic child protection issues and learning national lessons from child deaths and other cases involving serious harm to children.
Minister O’Gorman also praised the work of the outgoing Special Rapporteur, Professor Conor O’Mahony. The Minister said:
“I would like to thank Professor O’Mahony for his work as Special Rapporteur on Child Protection over the last three years. The comprehensive annual reports as well as the other priority reports delivered during his tenure are of interest to my own department as well as to a number of other departments and agencies. His work has been influential in the development and review of child protection policy and legislation as well as across the wider system."
The terms of reference of the Special Rapporteur are as follows:
1. The Rapporteur shall, in relation to the protection of children and on the request of the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth:
a) Review and report on specific national and international legal developments for the protection of children;
b) Examine the scope and application of specific existing or proposed legislative provisions and to make comments/recommendations as appropriate; and
c) Report on specific developments in legislation or litigation in relevant jurisdictions.
2. The Rapporteur shall report on relevant litigation in national courts and assess the impact, if any, such litigation will have on child protection.
3. The Rapporteur shall prepare, annually, a report setting out the results of the previous year’s work in relation to 1) and 2) above.
4. The Rapporteur will provide, if requested by the Minister, discrete proposals for reform, prior to the submission of the annual report.
5. The annual report of the Rapporteur will be submitted to the government for approval to publish and will be laid before the Oireachtas and published.
The Rapporteur is accountable to the Oireachtas and is entitled to consult with Departments of Government and the Ombudsman for Children about any legislative initiatives designed to enhance child protection.
All of the reports of the Special Rapporteur are laid before the Oireachtas and are published on the website of the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth.
Caoilfhionn Gallagher KC FRSA is an international human rights lawyer and barrister, specialising in human rights law, public law, inquests, community care, prison law and media law. Ms Gallagher has particular expertise in children’s rights, arbitrary detention and State accountability for wrongful deaths, and she is a leading international expert in journalists’ safety and the deaths of journalists. Since 2005 she has acted in many landmark cases, including acting for bereaved families and survivors of the 7/7 London Bombings and the Hillsborough Disaster; in a series of cases which have changed the law on the treatment of children in police custody in the UK; and in legal challenges to the adverse impact of benefit cuts upon single parents, disabled children, carers and survivors of domestic violence. She has also acted for victims of child sexual exploitation in Rotherham, addressing complex issues of inter-agency failures by police and children’s services, and for over 100 Core Participants (child sexual abuse survivors and organisations) in the UK’s Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse (IICSA).
In the field of children’s rights, Ms Gallagher has acted in many leading cases internationally, before the European Court of Human Rights, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council and United Nations bodies. She regularly advises governments, NGOs and individuals on issues concerning the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. This includes advising the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime regarding international standards of protection for children’s rights in respect of child soldiers and Boko Haram. She has published widely on human rights and children’s rights issues.
Ms Gallagher is the co-founder and co-head of the Doughty Street Chambers Children’s Rights Group, which brings together practitioners, academics and other specialist international lawyers to consider and advise upon existing or proposed legislative provisions in relation to children and to recommend change where needed.
Ms Gallagher worked at Liberty (the National Council for Civil Liberties), London from 2003 – 2005; and she taught undergraduate law students at University College Dublin (1999-2001), Trinity College Dublin (2000-2001) and the London School of Economics (2004-2005).
In 2017 Ms Gallagher was appointed a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA), for her “outstanding contribution to the protection of human rights.”