Jillian van Turnhout (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chairman and I thank all who presented to the committee today. I thought I knew quite a lot about the matter but it is always good to hear different perspectives and to probe how we feel on the different issues.

In regard to the legal inputs, it is very welcome to have it on the record of the House and - while it is at variance with the Department's legal people - I think it is in line with what Dr. Geoffrey Shannon also said to us, that it is up to us as the Oireachtas to legislate. We have to take that role responsibly and ensure we do that.

Perhaps further consideration can also be given to the issue of the timescale for appeals. I also note the comments about step-parent adoption which has come up previously. When the Houses legislated for the Child and Family Agency Bill 2013 it was said that this Adoption (Information and Tracing) Bill would look after step-parent adoptions. We do need to ensure that it is raised up.

I will now turn to the matter of statutory declaration. When the Bill was announced, if I am honest I can say that I only half understood why it was included. However, these hearings are convincing me. As Ms Pemberton has said, a statutory declaration introduces a legal dimension into what is a very individual and personal matter. When drawing up the heads of the Bill with Senator Power and Dr. Fergus Ryan, we included the provision for a meeting or a counselling session. I understand that not everyone was happy with that as a device but I believe it to be a much more appropriate mechanism in that there is some point in time when one can connect. I agree with others that this does not necessarily have to be done by the agency. We have accredited bodies and they could be a good starting point for us. We have the expertise of many organisations but in particular we have seen the work of Barnardos today and some of the material it has sent to us. The information that Barnardos provides could be very useful if we are looking at that issue.

In regard to the matter of compelling reasons, which is one we keep coming around to and we are still none the wiser, I agree with Dr. O'Mahony's observation that we could be starting to chip away at rights. The Barnardos submission contains a proposal that perhaps it could be up to the Adoption Authority, or perhaps more appropriately the courts, to determine if there is a compelling reason. That might be a safeguard and I would welcome advice from our legal people on whether that could be included. We are told we must include the reference to "compelling reasons" for constitutional balance, so how do we ring-fence it so that compelling reasons becomes a high bar? The bar should be an actual case that demonstrates compelling reasons so that we can say "Yes, that is what we should be doing".

On the question of the right to identity, it has been very valuable for this committee today to have had people like Martin, Mary and Cathy appear before us and who were able to give us their personal testimonies. When the Child and Family Agency Bill was presented in the Seanad I took a quote from the author of Roots. Alex Haley says: “In all of us there is a hunger, marrow-deep, to know our heritage - to know who we are and where we have come from. Without this enriching knowledge, there is a hollow yearning .. and the most disquieting loneliness". Equally, we have a past that we have begun to address and that we have to show. However, the difficulty all too often is that we have cloaked adoption in secrecy and it has made society complicit in suppressing women and children and their respective rights. Part of what we are trying to do today and in the Bill is to try to unpack that and shine a light. We know that sunshine is the best disinfectant.

These hearings have been most valuable. The committee will put together a report of recommendations. Having spoken with officials I know there is much work involved from what we are dealing with now - the heads of the Bill - to what is going to be. They need to do that work and we want them to take on the recommendations of the committee but that will take time.