Supporting Ireland’s young people

The Ombudsman for Children’s Office (OCO) is a human rights organisation set up in 2004 to promote the rights and welfare of all children living in Ireland.

Accountable to the Oireachtas, the OCO investigates complaints about children’s public services. The service is free and independent. The Ombudsman for Children is Niall Muldoon, who was first appointed to the role in 2015 by President Michael D Higgins and reappointed for a second term in 2021.

The Ombudsman for Children Act 2002 sets out the framework for the OCO’s complaints work. Under this, it determines if a public body’s administrative actions have had an adverse effect on a child or children. Anyone can make a complaint to the OCO, including a child or an adult on their behalf, if they have already gone through the local complaints process with that service and are still not happy with the outcome.

The majority of complaints to the OCO come from parents or professionals working with children, and in 2024, 3 per cent of complaints were from children themselves. Education, Tusla and concerns about health services are typically the most complained about issues. The OCO also publishes investigations arising from its complaints work with recommendations for a public body where it sees the need to highlight systemic issues that are impacting children.

Central to the OCO’s work in promoting children’s rights is consulting directly with children and ensuring their voices are heard on issues that affect them. The OCO’s Youth Advisory Panel of young people aged between 13 and 18 is integral to this. The OCO also meets with more than 2,000 children every year through its rights education workshops with schools at the OCO Office in Dublin city centre, as well as through outreach visits, consultation and OCO events.

Child Talks, the OCO’s annual flagship event celebrating World Children’s Day at the Helix in Dublin, brings together children from across the country to speak about the issues that affect their lives. This provides a unique, national platform for children to highlight their experiences and concerns and reinforces the importance of listening to children in discussions about public services and society more broadly.

The OCO also runs a School Ambassador programme where it teams up with primary and secondary schools every year to work with them to raise awareness of children’s rights. Providing advice to Government on policies and laws that impact children is another way the OCO promotes the rights of children.

The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) guides the work of the OCO. Despite being ratified by the State more than 30 years ago, it is not part of our law. The OCO is calling for full and direct incorporation of the UNCRC into domestic legislation to be the bedrock of the Government’s commitment to children, so that their rights are always considered when decisions are being made that impact them. This would be a game changer for children’s rights in Ireland and the OCO will continue to push for this to happen. Let’s get it right for children’s rights.

Find out more:
W: www.oco.ie