Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour)

Considering the importance of Vietnam as a country for adoption by Irish couples and families, it is an absolute disgrace the Government allowed the bilateral inter-country agreement between Ireland and Vietnam to lapse on 1 May 2009. The Minister of State, Deputy Barry Andrews, is the one most responsible in this matter. He was warned by supporting NGOs, prospective adoptive families and Members of the House on numerous occasions in recent months that time was running out on renewing the agreement. However, he showed no sense of urgency and took no urgent steps to ensure a fresh agreement was in place by 1 May.

In this case, the blame cannot be laid at the door of the recession. It was plain, old fashioned negligence and laziness. If the Minister had travelled to Vietnam last year, undoubtedly everything would have been resolved by now. It was not until the week commencing 20 April 2009 that the Minister bothered to send an Irish delegation to Vietnam, a week before the expiry date on 1 May. Too little too late.

France had no difficulty negotiating a new bilateral adoption agreement with Vietnam. Why should Ireland be different? If only the effort had been made.

Now over 1,500 prospective adoptive families who are at various stages of the adoption process are left in the lurch. They do not know when, or if, a new agreement will be reached. Their efforts to adopt have been stopped dead at various stages of the process, short of the referral stage.

The hundreds of Vietnamese children, most of whom are living in orphanages in poor conditions and had the expectation of a new life in a family environment in Ireland, have had their hopes, and perhaps their futures, dashed. The very minimum the Minister should have done was to put in place an interim agreement to continue the process pending the negotiation of a new agreement.

As a mitigating factor in his defence, the Minister of State claims the need to ensure the principles of the Hague Convention are adhered to. That is not the case. It is simply another reason he should have acted with alacrity and circumspection to resolve the matter.

Issues with other countries regarding the Hague principles, particularly Russia, have yet to be resolved. It is high time the Minister of State fulfilled his responsibilities to all concerned at home and abroad.

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