Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

When we spoke at length about this last week, I said that this is a certain part of the hidden history of Ireland. I have had a long personal involvement in this issue. I know many people who were in these homes and institutions. I told Deputy McDonald last week that Judge Yvonne Murphy has been appointed by the Government to conduct an inquiry. Rather than rushing the terms of the inquiry, it is important for us to get the terms right. I said last week that I believe the terms should be comprehensive. A number of significant issues relating to mother and baby homes have been raised by individuals and groups. I advised the Deputy last week of what has been happening to date. Individual records of institutions around the country have been made available in cases in which requests have been made to the registrar of births, marriages and deaths. Records relating to Tuam, which is one of the best-known cases to have been highlighted in the media, have been made available on foot of the work of a local historian.

The second is the case of the records of the very large mother and baby home is Bessborough in Cork. As I pointed out to Deputy McDonald previously, there was an extensive interdepartmental interim report on the state of knowledge of the various issues that have arisen to date in Ireland's quite sad history in this area. It is important for the sake of the people who were in mother and baby homes that we have whatever expert assistance is required from people like historians, archivists and so forth in order that the records are retained. The state of the records varies enormously. Some of them were handed over to the HSE while others remain with the original bodies involved, both adoption societies and individual institutions. It is essential, from the point of view of those who were in mother and baby homes, that their records are maintained, for themselves, their children and grandchildren. As the Deputy knows, this does not just affect people who were brought up in Ireland or the UK. It also affects several thousand people from mother and baby homes who were brought up in the United States of America. We heard testimony from Ms Philomena Lee at a recent conference on adoption about the importance of being able to access the records. I look forward to the terms of reference coming-----

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