Irish woman detained by Israeli forces in West Bank ‘fighting deportation order'
The son of an Irish woman detained by Israeli police in the West Bank on Saturday claims she was targeted for standing in solidarity with Palestinian people.
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Irish Examiner
35 minutes ago
- Irish Examiner
'RTÉ investigates' shows dire practices in privately-run nursing homes
Residents at two privately-run Irish nursing homes were left to sit in their own urine and subjected to manhandling by staff, among many other abuses, a bombshell new investigation shows. RTÉ Investigates will tonight broadcast Inside Ireland's Nursing Homes, the result of a months-long undercover investigation at two nursing homes — The Residence in Portlaoise and Beneavin Manor in north Dublin City. The programme details a litany of questionable behaviour and practices, including: A resident with mobility challenges being left on their own in a bathroom; A man being refused a toilet break for 25 minutes due to chronic understaffing; A frail female resident with dementia, considered a serious fall risk, being left alone on the edge of her bed for several minutes at night while confused and agitated and seeking a toilet break; A man repeatedly being left sitting in an unchanged incontinence pad despite still being able to use a toilet and having requests to do so denied; 'Fake' lists of activities created for residents' logs in order to show their time as occupied by pursuits, when the sole activity noted for residents was watching television. The cost for a resident staying at the two homes in question is €1,320 and €1,514 per week. The investigation will likely lead to renewed calls for Ireland to enact an adult safeguarding law — which was promised after a similar scandal at the Leas Cross nursing home in north Dublin in 2005, but which has never introduced. The investigation also found that understaffing is endemic at the two homes, which are run by French corporate Emeis. It has been the subject of similar scandals in France in the past five years. The undercover investigation shows one staff member typically assigned to care for more than 20 residents at a time, particularly at night. This means that residents cannot be brought to the bathroom or taken outside for exercise and are typically confined to one overcrowded room. The scene involving the frail female dementia payment is particularly distressing — with the lady in question calling for help for several minutes before finally being attended to by a nurse. Another shows a healthcare assistant declaring that 'these bells are driving me mad' as assistance bells ring out across a corridor in the Portlaoise home, with no staff available to answer them. Staff are informed that if all incontinence pads in their itinerary are used, they will have to make do with 'what's there'. A nurse is heard on camera objecting to this practice, noting that 'incorrect incontinence wear is a form of abuse'. The practice of 'double-padding' — placing two incontinence pads on a person in order to double the amount of moisture to be collected, which can lead to pressure sores — is also depicted in detail. The investigation also shows multiple staff at the two homes ignoring care plans indicating that frail residents should only be moved using hoists, with manual handling forbidden. Instead, staff are seen moving residents by gripping them under their arms or by their trouser belts. Neither Emeis nor the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa) had replied to a request for comment at the time of publication. Hiqa had repeatedly inspected the two homes featured in recent years. The most recent inspection of the Portlaoise home found that the institution was 'short-staffed', with some residents who were at a high risk of malnutrition. Emeis told RTÉ that the evidence of poor care standards, handling care plans being ignored, and the lack of dignity afforded to residents is 'deeply distressing', adding that it 'does not tolerate any individual or systemic neglect or practices'. Addressing the evidence uncovered by the investigators, David Robinson, a consultant geriatrician at St James Hospital in Dublin, said the situation is 'about abuse'. 'There is no other word for it, really,' he said. 'This is going to shorten people's lives and the lives that they have will be more miserable because of the situation that they're in,' said Prof Robinson. Read More Home care regulation will reduce choice and boost big firms' profits
Irish Independent
4 hours ago
- Irish Independent
Domestic abuse victims ‘re-traumatised' at custody and access proceedings
Cian Ó Broin Research into the Irish family law system has found that adult and child victim-survivors of domestic abuse are being 're-traumatised' during guardianship, custody and access proceedings. International evidence has shown that the prevalence of domestic violence and abuse (DVA) in all family law cases is disproportionately high, but the Irish system is 'not sufficiently DVA-informed or responsive'.
Irish Independent
4 hours ago
- Irish Independent
State still missing targets despite 70pc of new vehicles bought last year being electric
Analysis by transport management firm Geotab shows that while the public sector is setting the pace for replacement of petrol and diesel with electric, it still has a long way to go. At the end of last year, 782 of a total of 13,058 state-owned vehicles were fully electric – up from 550 in 2023. It is a significant improvement on 2019, when the Government first set a target for EV adoption for the whole country. It emerged at the time that just 13 state-owned cars were electric. Since then, the percentage of the fleet that is powered by electricity has grown from 1.1pc in 2020 to 1.7pc in 2021, 2.6pc in 2022, 4.3pc in 2023 and 6pc in 2024. However, the fleet has also almost doubled in size in that period, so there are now more petrol and diesel cars to replace. Across the country, the proportion of fully electric vehicles on Irish roads is around just 3pc. Buying electric also made better financial sense, with a possible saving of €12,900 per vehicle over a seven-year period 'While the latest figures on the increasing number of EVs in the state fleet make for positive reading, there is still a long way to go in terms of adoption of zero-emission vehicles,' said Oliver Holt of Geotab. 'The Public Sector Climate Action Mandate has clearly been a positive influence, but significant momentum now needs to be built whereby vehicles are being proactively replaced as opposed to waiting for procurement cycles in order for the change to finally happen.' The mandate requires government departments and state bodies to buy only zero-emission vehicles wherever possible. It was drawn up to set an example for the rest of the country, to ensure taxpayers' money was being spent on cleaner options and to help boost supply in the second-hand EV market. Geotab analysis found buying electric also made better financial sense, with a possible saving of €12,900 per vehicle over a seven-year period. Under the country's first Climate Action Plan, published in 2019, the aim was to have 945,000 EVs by 2030. Latest indications are that the very best that might be achieved by then if there is a rapid acceleration in switching from petrol and diesel is 640,750.
