Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)

Regarding the Statute of Limitations, the period is six years. While I have not got definitive legal advice from the Attorney General, we are still in the process of drawing up a memorandum for Government that I hope to take to the Cabinet meeting on 6 April so that we can make a decision on how to proceed. Trying to assemble all the information and thereby get a definitive opinion from the Attorney General has been a mammoth task. However, I have already put on the record the preliminary advice from the Attorney General that we cannot use the Statute of Limitations against anyone of unsound mind. Furthermore, for anyone now alive to seek to prove that he or she was of unsound mind would be an impossible task, as the Deputies can imagine, and a very unfair task to ask anyone to undertake.

I have been told that there are 22,000 people alive whose estates are affected, so that most of those affected have passed away. Regarding those still alive, the breakdown between those people in what I might call mental health institutions and those in the category of the elderly seems to be 50-50. That is my understanding.

The figure of €1.15 billion was the Department's estimate before the Supreme Court of what we raised since 1976. That seems to be the approximate figure for what was raised by way of charges for the people involved in publicly funded beds, whether in county homes or in psychiatric or mental health institutions. However, when it comes to repayment, the issue of interest arises. That is why some of the figures we are now discussing are somewhat higher than the figure of €1.15 billion. One has to consider interest and what someone could have earned if he or she had put the money in the post office or somewhere else. They are some of the issues that arise.

I assure Deputy Twomey that from the time I became aware of this matter, the last thing I have done is to fudge. I appointed John Travers because I was not satisfied with the report given to me, which I brought to the Cabinet. I only became aware of the deficiencies in that report 48 hours after I received it. I asked John Travers to look at all the issues and documents and give me a report so that I could establish what has happened and why this matter had not been dealt with in the past. That is what his report sought to do.

I have made many documents available, which were not even in the Travers report. Last week I made available some documents including those from the line division in the Department. I also gave an undertaking to make other documents available. Is is very rare for governments to release the legal advice they are given, but I can supply documents of a legal nature only if they do not prejudice any upcoming court cases. There are a number of cases pending. Most of them relate to the nursing home issue, private institutions and nursing home subventions, and they are intertwined in the legal advice the South Eastern Health Board had. That is why the Attorney General has strongly advised me that I could jeopardise the proceedings of this State if I were to put that advice into the public domain. As a responsible Minister I must take that advice.

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