Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)

That would bring us very close to a 50:50 deal. In the area of education, I have responsibility for this country's 3,200 primary schools, some 92% of which are under the patronage of the Catholic Church, and 728 post-primary schools. Many of our school buildings are located on the grounds of religious orders and are partially if not totally owned by the patron in question. They were financed from the contributions of the members of the parish or more recently funded by grants from the State. The most recent set of schools are all owned by the State and leased out to the operating patrons. I have said to the religious congregations that the only reason we want the full freehold ownership - the ultimate founding title deed - of the school infrastructure is that it would allow us to ensure those schools are not sold off into the private sector. I have assured them that for the duration each building remains to be used as a school, it will be used under the existing patronage of the patron and with the ethos of that patron, until such time as they voluntarily choose to change it. This is not confiscation. It is a way of enabling them to make their 50:50 contribution without disrupting the delivery of the service for which those buildings are currently used.

I have not had similar discussions of the same extent or detail with the religious congregations that own large hospitals around the country. Not all of our hospitals are so owned. However, the same principles would prevail for my purposes and those of this debate. I think this will be seen in years to come as the settlement that was made by the religious congregations which, at the behest of the State, abused their power. The State abused or neglected its own power to properly monitor what the congregations were doing. We are all guilty in this respect. It is not the case that "them over there" perpetrated this abuse against the most vulnerable people in society. It was us. Our predecessors in this Chamber refused to raise the questions that many of them heard. Indeed, many people in society saw what was happening and chose not to say anything about it. We have to learn a lesson from the past.

The €110 million fund that will be assembled will be used to deal with the consequences of the abuse that occurred. It will not be used to compensate for the abuse that occurred. That process has already taken place and was availed of by the 15,000 people who chose to apply. I would like to address a question that was asked in that regard. We have heard examples of the cases of people who, for some reason, chose not to apply even though the window was open for many years. That was the choice they made. It has been suggested that those people and others, such as those from the Magdalenes and Bethany House, should also be included in this round of monetary compensation. It was suggested the money should go straight to the victims, not for counselling and for related services and purposes. To divide 15,000 into €110 million will produce a very small sum of money relative to the 15,000 that went into €1.5 billion. There are residual needs out there that need to be met.

We have chosen to avoid the extraordinarily bureaucratic quango-type operation that would come into existence if we were to open up eligibility to everyone and anyone again. Quite frankly, the time taken to process such an open-ended set of applications would be enormous. That is why, reluctantly but necessarily, to respond exactly to the sentiments that were expressed by Deputy Clare Daly, and not to have an open-ended, long, tortuous, bureaucratic quango come into existence, we have decided pragmatically, in the full knowledge of the decision we were making, that we would use the database of the 15,000 people who have already been given awards. That is the database that is already there - we know what it is. To start again, given their age and given the period when the abuse took place, would have taken an enormous amount of time in terms of processing and verifying that information.

I know that answer does not satisfy the requests and demands made by some people but I am giving it here, on the floor of the House on the conclusion of the Second Stage debate, to fellow Deputies so that they understand it. While they may not agree with it, I am giving the logic and the rationale behind it.

In conclusion, I say to the Members of this House and the other House that we will engage in a Committee Stage debate. I am open to constructive proposals and amendments that make sense, are practical and can be implemented. At the end of the day, the people to whom we are addressing the proceeds of this fund and related matters are fellow citizens whom we collectively in this State, or our parents and grandparents collectively in this State, allowed to be abused under our watch, in this Republic.

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