Mr. Justice Alan Mahon:

One other thing I should emphasise is the fact that because of the 12-month limitation period - which I mentioned in the opening statement - and because most of the allegations that have been made in the Women of Honour programmes and interviews are relatively historical in nature, these may be reasons most of them would not have been referred to my office. They would go back a number of years and I do not have the jurisdiction to deal with complaints that are more than one year old.