Minister promises legislation for mother and baby home survivors

THE Children’s Minister has said the outline of the plans for legislation allowing survivors of mother and baby homes access to their personal information will be published by early April.

Roderic O’Gorman also said elements of the mother and baby homes report were a ‘disappointment’ to survivors.

He told the Seanad the failings of the State, which were repeated over many decades, had the ‘most horrendous’ consequences for the most vulnerable in society.

The homes had high levels of infant mortality, and there was misogyny and stigmatisation of some of society’s most vulnerable, the independent report found. It was published last week.

Mr O’Gorman said: ‘I know elements of this report are a disappointment to survivors. Sections where a strictly legalistic approach was taken to the profoundly personal impacts of what happened in the institutions, sections where the commission’s conclusions that it could not find evidence of what happened and where this could be interpreted as a denial of experiences of survivors.’

He added that parts of it stood out as an ‘unambiguous’ statement of the suffering of mothers and their children and as a testament to the ‘lived truth’ of what happened in the institutions.

The Green Party TD also said it was a ‘clear articulation’ of the repeated failings of the Church and the State. He reiterated the Taoiseach’s apology to mothers and children on behalf of the State and said he too was ‘deeply sorry’ for the hurt experienced. He added that the Government would prioritise the publication of the information and tracing legislation, and that many former residents were of an age where they needed to see immediate action.

He also said he had written to religious congregations and charities seeking their engagement on the issues of apologies, their own contributions to redress and the provision of institutional records.

Independent Senator Victor Boyhan, who grew up in institutional care, said there were ‘glaring holes’ in the report. He described what happened there as ‘shocking and terrible’.

‘I was born in the Dublin Union in St Kevin’s, which is now St James’s Hospital, and I wasn’t adopted so this report leaves many glaring holes,’ he said. ‘We talk about mother and baby homes and children that were in homes and adopted. But what about children who weren’t?

‘They went on to be in full-time residential care,’ he said. ‘If there were horror stories in the mother and baby homes, there were even greater horror stories in long-term care. I speak as a man who has lived the experience.’ He said: ‘Anyone who was in care and was subject to, or should have been under some sort of supervision by the State, must get redress.’

Green Party Senator Pauline O’Reilly said some institutions run by the State were among the worst in the country.

‘Women were incarcerated in a system that made no attempt to show kindness or to make amends for past abuses,’ she told the Seanad.

‘They were put there by a State that did not provide them with alternatives, that did not prosecute rape, did not provide them with contraceptives and that acted in a way that was deferential to a Church that used its power to abuse other,’ Senator O’Reilly added.

‘The report leaves many glaring holes’