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

We are all here today because of the continued refusal of the Minister, this Government and the State to respect basic principles of justice and laws, as the will and preference of survivors in relation to the mother and baby institutions. At all stages, survivors have been met with paternalism, disregard, disrespect and attempts to undermine their position.

In June 2021 the Minister announced a plan for an independent expert to examine, through a human rights lens, the testimonies given to the commission. Why? It is because the Minister knows, I know, and we all know that the findings of the commission's report were incorrect. The Minister's decision to do this only came after months of sustained criticism from survivors, human rights experts and researchers, concerning the commission's methodology, treatment of witnesses, inconsistencies, and overall poor quality of the final report and its findings, down to the most basic things such as no evidence of illegal adoptions, things we all know happened.

There was an overwhelming consensus that the review was necessary to correct the major issues with the final report as the definitive document on the long history of the State and church abuse of children, girls and women in these horrific institutions. The review remains essential to respect the wishes of survivors, to meet our international human rights obligations, and to inform redress. It was also around the time of the refusal of the commission members to provide any form of accountability at this committee and the Government's inability to act. The Government would not extend the commission and would not do anything even though we warned the Minister that this would fall back on the Government as a result, and here we are.

Despite the fact that in June 2021 the Minister had proposals ready for Cabinet, 14 months later in August this year survivors discovered, via Elaine Loughlin in the Irish Examiner, that the Minister had abandoned the plan. In the words of the Tuam Mother and Baby Home Alliance, the Minister has denied members and those who provided testimony to the confidential committee the opportunity to have those testimonies reviewed by an independent expert with a human rights background, as previously promised.

The Minister's opening statement says it all. The Minister has said: "I believe that a process with the capacity to record, preserve and recognise survivors’ personal accounts presents the most meaningful opportunity to address the concerns expressed to me." The Minister has satisfied himself but nobody else in the process: not survivors, not campaigners, and not human rights experts. Unilaterally, the Minister has decided what is best, has betrayed another commitment, and now is trying to tell the people directly affected that this is the best thing. The Minister knows that he knows better than them. I wonder if the Minister understands the arrogance and paternalism of his words today to those people.

In June 2021 the Minister had a proposal ready for consideration at Cabinet. More than one year later the Minister decided that "Significant legal complexities would arise in seeking to facilitate an external review of accounts provided privately and in confidence within the robust legal framework of a commission of investigation." Why were these legal complexities not discovered before the Minister announced the independent review ? From his own accounts the Minister had an ill-prepared proposal that gave false hope to a highly vulnerable group of people

On the Minister's third point he said: "I believe that such a review could not fully respond to the concerns of those who were unhappy with the record of their testimony created by the commission." There are two issues here. In June 2021 a review was an appropriate mechanism to respond to survivors' concerns. Then in August 2022 it was not. The Minister is contradicting himself. Then there is the issue of deciding how to address survivors' concerns and not asking them. Again, without input from those affected, the Minister is deciding for them. This is more paternalism. Does the Minister not see those contradictions and the paternalistic attitude? I actually do not understand how there is not any kind of shame about these kinds of inconsistencies and the misleading of people.

Another excuse that the Minister mentions is "The Government cannot, via a non-statutory process, retrospectively alter or interrogate the independent commission’s findings or methodology." The Minister can interrogate the report via a statutory process so why is he not looking into that? Is the Department looking into that?

Reading over all of the documents, the Minister's statements, and the initial announcement in June 2021, I can only come to one of two conclusions. Either the plan for an independent review was poorly prepared, did not stand up to any form of scrutiny and had to be abandoned, or the plan was opposed by the Minister's Department or another State actor and the Minister was shut down. Both are plausible from the evidence available to us: the disgraceful treatment of survivors with this "make it up as you go along" approach, or the prevalent ingrained structural forces in Government Departments and State bodies not to provide survivors with justice. Which is it?