Child-welfare services come under fire

The case of an aunt questioning pension payments for three children orphaned following an accident in which both parents died has brought to light an anomaly which the Catalan ombudsman's office sees as being discriminatory. The case in point has revealed that Catalonia's child-welfare services (DGAIA) has retained some of the pension due to one of the children to pay for costs of supervising the child's welfare and while this is not a wide-spread practise, the ombudsman's office has turned up other such cases. The department believes this practise to be legal. The payouts are calculated by Spain's social security department and the DGAIA receives €1.6 million annually while the costs total €1.1 million. In some cases, the children are cared for in welfare service homes or centres but in the case of the aforementioned children, for example, the three have lived with their aunt and grandparents, however, part of the payment was kept by the DGAIA for “supervision”.