Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I wish to begin by acknowledging the hurt and absolute devastation being experienced by the Kriegel and Valdez families over the past number of days. Our thoughts and prayers are with them. Both Ana Kriegel and Jastine Valdez were taken violently and brutally and their families and communities have been left broken-hearted. I pay tribute to the gardaí and first responders for all they are doing in such very devastating and traumatic situations.

In 2014, Louise O'Keeffe won a major breakthrough case in the European Court of Human Rights in regard to the State's culpability in child sexual abuse in our primary schools. The Government's response to that judgment has been a significant failure and, I would argue, represents the very worst of an adversarial approach to victims of child sexual abuse in our schools. They were abused by teachers who have subsequently been convicted. The response to the decision of the European Court of Human Rights is a scandal in itself and it needs to stop. Why is the Government fighting survivors of sexual abuse tooth and nail?

The redress scheme and the conditions attached to it represent a deliberate and quite shocking interpretation of the O'Keeffe judgment. By imposing a condition of prior complaint on the availability of redress, the Government has shifted the onus from itself to take proactive and preventative measures to vulnerable children who are victims of sexual abuse, in other words, to make disclosures leading to complaints. We know that multiple international research studies show that the vast majority of children who were victims of sexual abuse do not disclose that abuse.

Those who do wait a significant period before doing so. Therefore, prior complaints are incredibly unlikely to exist. Indeed, even though there are 360 known victims of sexual abuse in national schools, a prior complaint has only been established in respect of a single abuser to date. As Dr Conor O'Mahony of the Child Law Clinic at University College Cork put it, the condition of prior complaint is not designed to limit the scope of liability, it is designed to eliminate it.

Just seven offers of settlement have been made under the scheme, all of which relate to prior complaints in respect of one single abuser even though at least 360 cases arise for consideration. A settlement rate of just 2% is not indicative of a humane, flexible or holistic approach. Are we really suggesting that the victims will have to go back to the European Court of Human Rights to get justice in terms of the Government's interpretation of the original O'Keeffe decision or that a second application must be made to the court? I have met the victims concerned. The Government is putting them through huge trauma right now because of the approach it has adopted. I ask the Taoiseach to change direction, to stop using the approach the Government is taking and to go back and give justice to those who were victims of such terrible abuse.

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