Dr. Niamh McCullagh:

I am glad the Deputy raised the issue of timescales. In the executive summaries of our excavation reports that were recently made available through the fifth interim report, we state that the site at Tuam specifically was put in a temporary holding situation whereby it would need attention immediately. We put a timeframe of less than six months on the kind of protection mechanisms we had put in place, essentially stating that the site needed to be dealt with as soon as possible. That was four years ago. I know everybody wants this to be done very quickly, but the speed with which one can proceed to the next stage will also impact on the recovery mechanisms. The chambers at Tuam have essentially been breached and, as such, have been introduced to a new environment. We do not know what impact that will have. We can only assume that the remains will degrade as time moves on. That is a fact we must face. Of course, as the experts have stated here, DNA is recoverable from many scenarios and massive historic timeframes but the difference in the context of the situation at Tuam is that there are mixed skeletal infant remains that are subject to the water table and fluctuations in water and are being separated from their individual articulation. That is the fact of the matter. It is a fact with which we can deal but we need to have the proper structures in place in order to deal with it appropriately and give the remains the best possible chance of individualisation and, it is to be hoped, identification down the road.