Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

In fairness, I did not interrupt the Minister of State. That was why difficulties arose with regard to Vietnam which could have been pre-empted at an earlier stage. The original bilateral agreement should never have contained provision for the making of financial payments for any purposes in Vietnam which could be linked to anything remotely connected to adoption. That was a failure of Government and a failure of judgment by the relevant Minister of State. It was not the current Minister of State, to be fair to him. It was a failure of judgment by his predecessor and the senior Minister in that Department at the time when the bilateral arrangement was concluded.

I refer to the 20 individuals. I am very conscious that hope has been held out to them that, at least they would be able to complete their adoptions. This has been going on for one year. In fairness to them it is important that finality is brought to the matter. I wish the Minister of State well in this regard and I hope he is successful in finding a mechanism that facilitates their completing the adoptions in circumstances in which we can be satisfied that the adoptions are sound and the factors and standards that must be adhered to are adhered to. It is extraordinary how long this process is taking. I ask the Minister of State to inform Members of the House, or at least the party spokespeople, in four weeks' time as to where matters stand between him and the Attorney General. The House will go into recess shortly and if there has been no developments by then, those individuals will be in contact with Deputies wanting to know what has happened.

At times during this process, there has been undue secrecy as to what is going on. People have been told not to talk about it in public or not to rock the boat. They are not sure whether progress of any description is being made. It is new information to me today that the Minister of State, within the last two weeks, has written to the Attorney General. I hope that produces a fruitful outcome.

It is of huge importance to this State that we are parties to the Hague Convention, that we apply it as soon as we can and that we apply proper standards to ensure the best interest of every child is protected in the adoption process. Our original legislation sought to ensure that the standards we apply domestically in adoption were applied in foreign states to those adoptions we were going to recognise. I do not see a difficulty in allowing for a transitional provision, such as the one I propose in amendment No. 2. We must recognise the human circumstances, difficulties and concerns of those who are trying to process their suitability applications to a conclusion.

The cut-off the Minister of State is proposing is arbitrary. If the social worker who is assessing one is on maternity leave or takes ill, one might not get one's declaration of suitability. People's destinies and hopes to have a family cannot be dependent on events as arbitrary as this. My amendment avoids that type of situation being a problem, as well as the circumstances surrounding what seem to be structural delays within the HSE in processing applications in different parts of the country. I am pressing the amendment.

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