Olwyn Enright (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)

This is a reasoned amendment. People have also spoken to me about the trauma they experienced in appearing before the redress board, which is the opposite to what was intended when the Residential Institutions Redress Board was established. What is being sought in the amendment is limited. It avoids calling for the naming of any abuser and, in that sense, it is still protecting the identity of any abuser or alleged abuser. However, it deals with the institution, which is important, because there may have been other people in that institution who were abused.

We must bear in mind that the redress board is not a court involving conviction. It is important that people should be allowed talk about the category of their abuse in broad terms and about the amount of the award. The difficulty people have in coming out to a wall of silence is that they do not know if their experience is limited to them or if it is part of a broader experience. Perhaps if they knew and they could talk to other people who had undergone the same experience, they might not feel as traumatised or victimised because they would realise that it was not just something which happened to them and that it was the way the board operated.

Due to the fact that we are operating under a cloak of secrecy in terms of the Residential Institutions Redress Board, people do not have any comparisons to make and this makes them feel isolated. It is difficult for them to decide if their award is appropriate. We have seen a few instances of people going to court after an award had been made. However, this was a shot in the dark to some extent. If people knew of the experiences of others, perhaps they would see that the decision made in regard to them was appropriate. The amendment does not go very far but it addresses in some way the issues I have raised.

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