Kathleen Funchion (Carlow-Kilkenny, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Amendment No. 8 relates to staff being independent but also properly qualified. When dealing with any sort of officialdom, a person's experience is often based on the person he or she meets or engages with. He or she remembers often remembers that person, sometimes for good reasons and other times for negative reasons. It is very important that anyone who is engaged in this is trained in trauma and everything around that.

I refer to the independence aspect. As the amendment states, "The Chief Operating Officer may appoint suitably qualified staff" and determine the needs of the office in "the performance of his or her duties.” I refer to there being the leeway to do that. This is important. We should be learning from other schemes and experiences. We have often heard that people had negative experiences in the past when they were trying to access records. It is important, therefore, that we learn from that, move on from those experiences and ensure it does not happen again.

Concerning amendment No. 9, the general scheme made provisions for the advertisement of the payment scheme here and abroad. No specific statement is made, however, that the information campaign will be advertised overseas. It is important that we ensure every effort is made through public advertisement here and abroad to ensure that people who were residents of an institution are made aware of this scheme. We all engage with survivors regularly and many people linked to and dealing with groups are well aware of everything going on. There are some people, though, who might not be aware of this information, particularly those living abroad and who may never have spoken about their experiences. Every effort should be made, where possible, in this regard.

Amendments Nos. 20 and 26 are also in this grouping. Amendment No. 20 is to "specify the length of time said information will be stored, confirmation if at the end of this period said information will be destroyed and by what means". This is important. It provides another layer of transparency for the office of the chief deciding officer, his or her staff, and, in particular, survivors, if information is to be kept after a decision has been made or after an appeals process, for example, in respect of it being clearly stated what will happen to all personal information at the end of that process. This is an extremely important aspect for survivors. We have had many discussions in this regard, and not just in the context of the mother and baby institutions, but, generally, concerning any of the institutional school survivors, records and access to records is always an issue. It has been a contentious issue at times over the years. It is important, therefore, that we are very clear about how information will be stored and what will happen to it. Such a clear statement will be good not just for survivors but important as well for those working in those roles.

Amendment No. 26 refers to "The Chief Deciding Officer, in consultation with the Minister may, by regulation, provide for the insertion in Schedule 1of any institution which was established for the purpose of providing maternity and infant care services and the placement of children for the purposes of adoption or care arrangements, and in respect of which a public body had a regulatory or inspection function". This amendment is to ensure that the decision to add an institution in Schedule 1 rests with the Minister and chief deciding officer in consultation, and that it would not be subject to the consent of the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform. In this amendment, we are trying to avoid a situation where this becomes a money issue and ensure that it is addressed by a Minister who has been dealing with this matter, which at the moment is the Minister present, as well as the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth. We think this is the appropriate Minister to deal with this issue, in consultation with the chief deciding officer.