Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour)

Three years ago, an inquiry was established under the chairmanship of Mr. Justice Frank Murphy with simple and straightforward terms of reference, unlike those for the inquiry into the Dublin archdiocese that has recently been established. The first of these terms was:

To identify what complaints or allegations have been made against clergy operating under the aegis of the Diocese of Ferns in relation to alleged events that transpired prior to 10 April 2002 and to report on the nature of the response to the identified complaints or allegations on the part of the Church authorities and any public authorities to which complaints or allegations were reported.

I pay tribute to all the victims who suffered and then courageously came forward and spoke up, thereby making the inquiry so successful.

The inquiry carried out its works effectively and comprehensively. It identified approximately 100 complaints against 21 priests and detailed many of the horrific sexual assaults committed on young boys and girls in the Ferns diocese over long periods. Some 66 serious allegations of intimidation, sexual assault, rape and buggery were made against the notorious Fr. Seán Fortune. He was not removed from his ministry by either Bishop Herlihy or Bishop Comiskey but was moved from parish to parish. To compound the matter, he was not removed from the chair of the board of management of Ballymurn national school. He was even allowed to open youth clubs and build reconciliation rooms for young people in the basement of his house. Similarly, Canon Clancy was allowed to assault and rape young girls aged from nine to 15 for a period of almost 30 years from 1965 to 1992. He was also allowed remain on in ministry and, as manager of the local national school, he used his position to gain access to young girls.

One of the disturbing findings by the inquiry was that "at various points in time during that period, members of the Garda, the teaching profession, the medical profession and the Church were aware of rumours and suspicious concerning Canon Clancy but no action was ever taken against him". I could give a number of other examples but the ones I have given are sufficient to highlight the abuse.

The report addresses a number of the recommendations to the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform. The astonishing aspect of the current state of the criminal law is that the superiors, who connived or were negligent in the cover-up of crimes committed by religious against children, appear to have committed no criminal offence. I do not believe that any of us appreciated that when we passed the Criminal Law Act 1997, abolishing what seemed to many to be the arcane offence of misprision of felony, we eliminated the possibility of a criminal offence having been committed in this area.

The report recommends consideration of a new criminal offence of "reckless endangerment". This would be modelled on a 2002 amendment to the Massachusetts criminal code, which provides that:

Whoever wantonly or recklessly engages in conduct that creates a substantial risk of serious bodily injury or sexual abuse to a child or wantonly or recklessly fails to take reasonable steps to alleviate such risk where there is a duty to act shall be punished by imprisonment in the house of correction for not more than 2 1/2 years.

This seems to be the basis of the Minister's proposal.

The Labour Party wholeheartedly supports this recommendation, which the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform has promised to insert as an amendment to the Criminal Justice Bill 2004. However, the Government needs to consider whether this is adequate. The creation of an offence along these lines will punish the individual who recklessly creates a situation of risk for children or who fails to alleviate the risk where there is a duty to act. However, it does not, of itself, create the duty to act and so the Government needs to consider on whom such a duty to act should be imposed. Related to this is the vexed question of mandatory reporting of crimes against children. Even with a new offence of reckless endangerment and even when we succeed in identifying those on whom there should be imposed a duty to act, it will remain the case that one could eliminate the risk of the future endangerment of a child while covering up that a child has already fallen victim to an act of sexual abuse committed by a known individual.

Mr. Justice Murphy says he did not consider the question of mandatory reporting since his terms of reference confined him to examining the practices of the Roman Catholic Church and such a practice had already been adopted on a voluntary basis by the church in 1996. In the absence of the benefit of recommendations from Mr. Justice Murphy we must work out an approach to this issue. Doing so has divided the Government parties in the past. In this regard, I oppose any blanket proposal that would compromise the ability of health professionals to provide therapeutic and other services to their patients. However, where a person is in a position of authority over another person, whether that authority is spiritual or temporal, and has information about crimes of abuse involving children committed by that other person, then the person in authority should be under a legal obligation to report those crimes. A failure or refusal to report such crimes, without reasonable excuse, should be an offence. While a reasonable excuse for not reporting might be that the victim is now an adult and will take no part in an investigation or prosecution, the general rule should be that those in authority should be obliged to disclose.

The State agencies in the Ferns diocese did not exactly cover themselves in glory. The inquiry found that the response of the South Eastern Health Board was inconsistent and inadequate in terms of support for the victims. The response of the Garda Síochána was also inconsistent and inadequate up to 1990 and many critical Garda files have completely disappeared. The response of the DPP was minimalist and "a prosecution was initiated by the DPP only where there were multiple alleged victims of an accused or in one case, where there was one victim and the incident was witnessed by family members". It was not until 1991 that the Child Care Act put children first and stated that the State must "regard the welfare of children as the first and paramount consideration".

The SAVI report of 2002 indicated that despite the extent of clerical child sexual abuse that prevailed in the Ferns diocese, 96% of child sexual abuse in Ireland is not clerical abuse. I compliment Colm O'Gorman and his team for the excellent and professional work that the One in Four group does. The 2004 report of that group stated that 27% of Irish women and men have experienced sexual violence as children and that adults who have experienced childhood sexual abuse are 12 times more likely to attempt suicide than those who did not.

It is time to grasp the nettle and declare this issue a national priority. It is time to initiate a national campaign to inform parents and professionals dealing with children. It is time to make children aware of their rights vis-À-vis adults in a position of trust and authority over them and to introduce supervisory procedures pertinent to the role of those who work regularly with children. It is time to establish a full Cabinet post of Minister for children's affairs.

We should further progress the Ferns Report by referring it to a joint Oireachtas sub-committee, representing the areas of justice, health and education, which would hold a series of hearings, inviting representatives of the victims of child sexual abuse and their respective organisations to tell their stories as we did on release of the Barron report. The sub-committee should also hear from the perpetrators and the relevant State and church agencies.

I welcome the decision to establish a commission of investigation into the archdiocese of Dublin and I also welcome the statement by the Archbishop of Dublin that he will co-operate fully with it. However, I have severe reservations that the commission can carry out its work in the 18 months allocated to it, considering that the non-statutory inquiry into Ferns, a much smaller diocese, took three years. Much preliminary work must also be undertaken before the main investigation can begin and the commission must also be on standby to investigate other dioceses that will require investigation as clear, prima facie evidence of widespread child sexual abuse in certain other dioceses already exists. We will argue these points in more detail when the terms of reference of the commission of investigation are put before the House. From now on, let us put children first.

See this speech in context