Michael Kennedy (Dublin North, Fianna Fail)

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for allowing me to speak on this topic concerning orphanages in Bulgaria. Although not immediately significant to this Parliament, this is an incredibly important and tragic issue which requires the greatest possible airing.

Some Deputies may have seen a BBC documentary on Sunday entitled "Bulgaria's Abandoned Children". It was made by film-maker Kate Blewett who last year visited the Mogilino social care home to investigate the conditions in which the children are kept. I am not exaggerating when I say that this is one of the most disturbing programmes I have ever seen. The circumstances shown in the film appear to be replicated throughout Bulgaria and I understand similar conditions obtain in at least 11 other orphanages.

I bring the issue to the attention of the House to ask what we can do. I cannot sit idly by without trying to publicise this issue. There are 75 children living at Mogilino, ranging from toddlers to teenagers approaching their 20s. Many have been abandoned to the orphanage because they have severe mental disabilities with which their parents simply could not cope. Others are affected by mild and treatable cases of cerebral palsy. Some were blind or deaf when they entered the orphanage. Many of the children at Mogilino cannot speak and they are neither taught nor spoken to. They cannot interact with each other or their carers whose job does not appear to extend beyond washing and feeding the children. It is clear that not much caring takes place.

The children are considered incapable of being educated and receive no treatment for their disabilities. While they are diagnosed on admission to the facility, their diagnoses are not re-evaluated at any point during their lengthy stay. Even the children with the mildest forms of disability degenerate quickly. They rock endlessly in chairs, bereft of any mental stimulation, and many are heavily sedated. They all appear to be malnourished and many sit on potties all day because it is easier for their carers to leave them in this position. Their limbs resemble those of children in famine-torn African countries.

One 18 year old girl who broke her leg was filmed lying curled up in a ball in bed. Her condition was not noticed until the television crew asked her what her problem was and only then did she received medical attention. Another child, a young boy, walked only when led by the hand by a carer. If the carer moved away from him, he stood motionless until the carer returned.

An 18 year old girl named Didi who has mild cerebral palsy initially wrote letters to her mother but these were never posted. She also interacted with the television crew in a typically lively teenage fashion. However, when the television crew returned eight months after initially meeting her, she had become a mute child who had adopted the rocking motion practised by all the other children. I was equally concerned by a scene in the programme where two male carers supervised a group of adolescent women, many of whom were fully developed physically, as they showered. This occurred in a home staffed almost entirely by females.

It is not an exaggeration to say that domestic animals are treated better than the unfortunate boys and girls in the Mogilino home who are condemned to rock silently while they slowly waste away in mind and body. Nothing on television this year has brought me closer to tears.

What can Ireland do about this case? How has Europe permitted this to happen while allowing Bulgaria to enter the European Union? Will we turn away from this pain and suffering? I hope not. We all remember watching similar scenes from Romania 20 years ago. The scenes I describe are taking place in 2007 in Bulgaria, a member state of the European Union. I ask the Government to take action in this matter. It should contact Ms Kate Blewett who is setting up a charity known as Bulgaria's abandoned children's trust to campaign for immediate changes to address the plight of the children in the Mogilino orphanage. Bulgaria is a European country with a population of more than 8 million in which one in every 50 children is growing up in an institution. As Kate Blewett stated in the television programme, it is not a destitute, war-torn or famine-stricken country. Many of the large number of Irish people who visit Bulgaria as tourists buy apartments there. Our role must be to try to influence the Bulgarian authorities and, more important, the Bulgarian people. I sincerely hope action will be taken on this issue.

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