Dan Neville (Limerick, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I, too, welcome the group. I have heard Ms Cregan talking about the organisation previously. Almost 20 years ago, I was very involved in the debate about the register of stillbirths and I learned much about bereavement from international literature. At the time, people did not recognise it as a bereavement. If one compares the bereavement of a stillbirth or an infant death, there is no funeral, sympathy or coffin. People do not line up and sympathise with the parents. They do not meet up with them a week later and tell them how sad they feel for their loss or ask them how they are coping. They do not talk about the child. Up to then, the child did not even have a name. The register gave the child a name, if the mother and father wanted it.

At that time there was a tendency to ignore the fathers in this situation. I hope that has changed. Having read Féileacáin's literature, it has changed. In the past there was an issue around recognising the father as a bereaved parent as well. There was some recognition, albeit very little, of the mother's trauma of bereavement, but that has changed. It is on the continuum of change. I believe as a society we have a long way to go to understand and recognise the death of a child.

My elder brother died at birth. He was born around Christmas and the nurse baptised him quickly and called him Noel. My mother spoke to us about her loss of Noel all through her life. His name is on the family headstone. One can see from my appearance, that this was at a different time. Our family responded in that way to his neonatal death.

Féileacáin has asked that 15 October would be recognised as a remembrance day of Baby Loss Awareness. How does one campaign to have official recognition of 15 October as Baby Loss Awareness Day? What do we as members of this committee need to do to have it recognised? What are the mechanics of the campaign?