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Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children

Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children
ISPCC official logo.png
Founded January 18, 1956; 61 years ago (1956-01-18)
Type Child protection
15958
Registration no. CHY 5102
Focus Child protection
Location
Coordinates 53°20′15″N 6°15′02″W / 53.337494°N 6.250452°W / 53.337494; -6.250452Coordinates: 53°20′15″N 6°15′02″W / 53.337494°N 6.250452°W / 53.337494; -6.250452
Origins National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children
Area served
Republic of Ireland
Key people
  • Grainia Long (CEO)
Revenue
€6.5million (2010)
Employees
97
Volunteers
469
Slogan "Never give up on a child. Ever."

The Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (ISPCC) is the national child protection charity in Ireland. It provides a range of services to children and families in Ireland, and promotes children's rights.

The ISPCC is best known for its free confidential listening service, ISPCC Childline, which is available by phone on 1800 66 66 66, by texting 'Talk' to 50101 and online at childline.ie. It also provides a range of support services from its offices around Ireland. Its support line is available daily to anyone in Ireland concerned about a child, on 01 6767690.

The ISPCC was founded as a successor to the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children which had operated in Ireland from 1889 to 1956.

The first Irish branch of the NSPCC was founded in Dublin in May 1889, with branches founded in Cork and Belfast in 1891.

The ISPCC provides a wide range of services. Annually, ISPCC Childline has over 400,000 conversations with children, through its phone, online and webchat services.

Childline is a free, anonymous and confidential service, that is available to children 24-hours a day by phone and by text and online from 10am-4am.

The society publishes an annual report which details the numbers and types of calls received and the reasons why children call.

Each branch of the NSPCC and ISPCC had an inspector who was paid a salary and was provided with a house that doubled as a local office. Their job was to investigate child abuse or neglect. They were nearly all men and were recruited from the ranks of retired army personnel and police. Each answered to a local committee of volunteers. A brown uniform was worn by inspectors and they were popularly known as "cruelty men".

Inspectors acted independently and were not answerable to the branch committee, though they were answerable to the honorary secretary of the committee, though the onus was on the inspector to communicate with superiors.

From the 1930s to the 1940s many people lived in squalid conditions. From the 1930s to the 1950s reports by the society graphically described the conditions that people lived in, as well as advocating that children moved from their families live with new families rather than be sent to industrial schools. When John Charles McQuaid became a patron of the society in 1956 the criticism of industrial schools advocacy of adoption and case studies vanished from reports. Membership also changed under McQuaid, who had targeted traditionally Protestant organisations such as the ISPCC and recruited larges numbers of Catholics who then gained positions of control.


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