Dr. Geoffrey Shannon:

I thank members for their interesting questions. Illegal adoptions have come up on several occasions and it is a topic about which I am concerned, as Senator Power suggested, that the authority be proactive. In terms of context, this issue was raised in an article published in the Irish Examinerby Conall Ó Fátharta a number of years ago. In the aftermath of that article, I brought to the next available board meeting a suggestion that we undertake a limited audit at the time. The figure the Senator was quoting, which actually was there were 100 cases in which there were not matches, emerged from that audit. As to the extent, it would be foolish of me to give any estimate in this regard. It undoubtedly is the case that there is a dark history in certain aspects of the way in which Irish society operated. It is important that we admit to that. As chair of the authority, I have been trying but given that we do not have an adoption file, in general the people coming to us seeking relief actually will have more information than will we on the matter. It is an issue we certainly will continue to monitor. I am quite struck, as I believe is the chief executive officer, by the number of people raising this issue at this meeting. However, I must state it is an issue about which I am concerned and am anxious that the authority provides some relief. It always troubles me when people who write to the authority express great distress at the fact that they are not in the position to receive basic information. It was poignantly raised by Deputy McLellan, when she spoke of how such right to information is hugely important, particularly medical information, to which she referred. I strongly am of the view that this type of information should be available to all adopted people because in terms of any genetic disorder that exists, it is difficult to advise. Consequently, there is a profound health issue underpinning this point.

This is all part of that balancing exercise between identity and privacy and how that is balanced ultimately. All I can do is assure members that the issue is getting the highest attention at authority level and that we will continue to look at what more we can do.

The legislation attempts to deal with this issue and the authority will do everything possible to assist. Susan Lohan from the Adoption Rights Alliance has been raising this issue consistently with the authority. She was, perhaps, the first person to raise the issue on our radar. We will continue to work with the support groups, which have been doing fantastic work in this area and have been drawing bad practice to our attention. All I can do here is to make a commitment that we will continue to do what we can as an authority on this issue.

I understand people's position in regard to the issue of compelling reasons. I want to be honest in terms of my response on this. There needs to be some type of balancing. It is my professional view that having some formulation, such as compelling reasons is necessary for this legislation to be constitutional. That is my view, however it is characterised. I share the views articulated by all members that people will have concerns that the compelling reasons will be an out in terms of not providing information. Ahead of this meeting and having read the transcript from last week and having seen this issue raised then, I looked to see whether this provision had been used in statutes previously. It has been used in two relatively recent statutes, namely, the Civil Registration (Amendment) Act 2014 and the Houses of the Oireachtas (Inquiries, Privileges and Procedures) Act 2013. Therefore, it might be worth while to look at those statutes.

It is possible to ring-fence what amounts to compelling reasons. I gave this further thought during the week because I understand it is an issue that will cause concern and anxiety. Compelling reasons exist prominently in the jurisprudence around State intervention. In the past, the State could only intervene in a marital family where compelling reasons existed. Therefore, there is significant judicial comment as to what amounts to compelling reasons. I wonder whether a way of dealing with this issue might be to give clear guidelines as to what compelling reasons will amount to. I hope this response is helpful in terms of providing clarification on this issue. The question of whether the legislation will be constitutional is dependent on having the checks and balances in place.

I also share the views expressed in regard to a statutory declaration. While a statutory declaration is not an absolute necessity, some type of mechanism is required. The points made are compelling, in terms of some type of mechanism being necessary to demonstrate a balance has occurred. There are two systems and I would think we should look at these two very different systems. We cannot rewrite the past. We have had this clean break adoption system since 1952. However, for the future, the fact we are amending the principal provision in the Adoption Act, which allows us to have a system to release information, will allow us much greater flexibility, particularly in regard to compelling reasons and the statutory declaration issue. This is important because we are advising people and mothers at the outset of that possibility.

Let me give an example of this. The Civil Registration (Amendment) Act is one example. A second example is the Children and Family Relationships Act where the provisions in terms of access to identity in respect of donor assisted human reproduction have much less onerous requirements in respect of accessing information when a child reaches 18 years of age. It might be useful to look at that legislation as a template.

I will now pass over to Ms Patricia Carey to respond on the issue of resources.