Holly Cairns (Cork South West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 19:

In page 14, to delete lines 34 to 36.

The amendment covers similar issues to those addressed by amendment No. 18. The amendment refers to subsections concerning what is called "general public interest", which in this Bill is a euphemism for a list of further restrictions. It restricts interventions based on several broad and ill-defined grounds including "public health", the potential impacts on "archaeological features" and, most worryingly, "the social and economic interests of the State". The State, not society or the survivors.

I cannot articulate how wrong, insulting and concerning these restrictions are. Again, I return to the insistence of witnesses that interventions are based on internationally defined criteria, not ambiguous and restricted approaches. The committee's pre-legislative scrutiny recommended the removal of barriers, yet the Minister has included a list of limitations to be deployed to block any intervention. An intervention could be refused because of potential cost or depending on the budget situation in any given year. This is ambiguous and is a relational standard that is not in compliance with human rights standards and transitional justice and has no place in law.

The history of injustice surrounding this issue, the refusal of State bodies to engage with survivors and give them basic information or recognise their rights at all combine to indicate that these criteria can and will be used to refuse interventions. This is also another case of the Minister ignoring the committee's recommendation that there should be no attempt to avoid action at sites for financial reasons. The cost and economic impact should not be a basis for not intervening.

We must be clear that any of these interventions are potentially not in the economic interests of the State. They could all lead to liability and potential court actions. At all stages, Departments and State bodies act to limit that possibility, and we have here a perfect example of that. The inclusion of public health is another ambiguous criterion. It is an ironic one given our chronic underinvestment in that area. Similarly, archaeological features, which are regularly paved over for infrastructural projects, are being elevated in significance to potentially prevent the examination of sites.

My amendment seeks to remove all of these restrictions, except for the requirement to respect the views of relatives of the persons buried at the site. This would be a transitional justice approach in which the need for justice and the perspectives of relatives are at the centre of the process, not Ministers, civil servants or economic interests.