Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We all accept the scale of the commission's task in investigating this shameful chapter in the State’s past. The need to investigate mother and baby homes and the provision of redress to survivors have been debated in the Chamber for the past 15 years. In 2005, my colleague, Deputy Ó Caoláin, called on the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform to include mother and baby homes in the work of the Ryan commission. Members of the Opposition in the Dáil and Seanad repeatedly called on Governments led by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael to recognise the wrongs endured by the women and children who passed through the doors of the institutions but their demands fell on deaf ears.

The Minister's recent apology to survivors for the further delay to the commission completing its work was welcome, for what it was worth. I accept the sincerity of her belief that by granting an extension of 12 months, the final report will provide a better picture of what happened in the institutions. Unfortunately, however, the Minister's sentiments are not matched by her Department's actions. I was alarmed to learn that it took two full years for her Department and the Department of Health to hand over the first tranche of discovery to the commission. Even after such an inexplicable delay, the material provided by both Departments was just one tenth of the documentation that would follow over the next year and a half. As late as November 2018, the commission was informed of many thousands of pages of discovery yet to be handed over.

While that is bad, the HSE has fared even worse. It has been unable to provide documentation of its involvement in institutions from as recently as 2006, as Deputy Mitchell noted. The fourth interim report indicates that the commission is dismayed that so little relevant documentation has been found by the HSE. It also reveals that the HSE does not have a system for storing or archiving material. How can it be that any State agency in 2019 does not have an archiving policy and procedure embedded in all levels of its administration function? As an aside, it is reminiscent of the behaviour of state authorities north of the Border, which seek to hide information from families seeking the truth about legacy inquests and past events.

Many survivors and families simply no longer have confidence in the Government or the State to do the right thing. It is as stark as that. They fear that the Government is dragging its heels in a cynical attempt to limit the State’s redress liabilities to a small group of survivors whose numbers decline with each passing year.

I make particular reference, as the Minister did, to the survivors of the Bethany Home. As she will know, detailed research undertaken by Dr. Niall Meehan on behalf of the survivors provides a catalogue of State culpability dating as far back as 1939. Let us not forget that statutory inspections of maternity homes began in 1934, and the Bethany Home was inspected from 1935. Just four years later, the State’s deputy chief medical adviser ignored the advice of a departmental inspector who wanted a Bethany Home nurse mother to be prosecuted for severe neglect. At least 247 children died in the institution. Some 222 of those babies and children have been memorialised by survivors in Mount Jerome Cemetery, and it is possible that more died. Children were routinely shipped out to unsuitable homes in Ireland and further afield. We know that at least 54 of those children died from convulsions, 41 from heart failure and 26 from malnutrition or starvation. In 2017, by examining the records of undertakers, the group discovered 25 additional children, many of whom also died from malnutrition.

Mr. Derek Leinster, arguably the leader of the group, has outlined his heartbreaking story of abuse and neglect, as are those stories of survivors who have since passed away without justice or redress. In 2016, the commission stated in its second interim report that, logically, children resident at the Bethany Home and similar homes should be eligible for the residential institutions redress scheme. I cannot for the life of me understand why the Minister has not taken it upon herself to champion that cause. I do not accept her blithely setting the matter aside and telling us that the Government position remains the same.

On Tuam, which the Minister mentioned, if legislation is needed for the gathering of DNA, let us have it promptly. We must listen to victims and survivors.

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