Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I warmly welcome the recent declaration by former judge Mr. Justice Iarfhlaith O'Neill, because it sweeps away the bogus barrier which this State sought to put in the way of a small group of blameless victims who are trying to pursue justice and recognition. Anybody who studied the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in respect of the O'Keeffe case will know that the State's interpretation was absolutely ludicrous. Mr. Justice O'Neill did not spare his words and said it represented an inversion of logic but, in fact, it was worse than that. It was a grotesque distortion and it was risible. The European Court of Human Rights found, as one fact among several others, that there had been a prior complaint in the Louise O'Keeffe case. It did not rule that, as a matter of law, a prior complaint was a legal prerequisite to compensation. Even a cursory examination of the judgment readily demonstrates that. The question, then, is why the State insisted on such a perverse interpretation. The sad fact seems to be that, even while the previous Taoiseach, Deputy Enda Kenny, was congratulating Louise O'Keeffe on her courage, her fortitude, and her tenacity in achieving victory in Europe his Government was, at the very same time, searching for some device, some artifice, to ensure that nobody would benefit from the victory of Louise O'Keeffe. It is a shameful chapter in the history of this country.

I am glad the Minister mentioned the Statute of Limitations being re-examined. Another hurdle in the way of the victims who were seeking justice was the requirement to establish that they initiated legal proceedings within the time set out in the Statute of Limitations, even if the proceedings were later withdrawn in light of subsequent court decisions. Many of those people were not in a position, financially or, because of the abuse they suffered, psychologically, to initiate legal proceedings. More important, the prevailing legal view of the time was that they would have no case. If we leave this criterion in place as it stands, are we now saying that people were expected to have gathered up the courage and the wherewithal to go to their solicitors, to be told that they had no case whatsoever but, nevertheless, to have insisted on their solicitors bringing the case forward, even in spite of the legal advice? If that requirement is left in place, a number of blameless, innocent victims will not be able to surmount the barrier and will be deprived of justice. It would be a manifest absurdity if they were expected to do that.

People have said that this is about money but it is not about money. The maximum somebody can be paid under the ex gratiascheme is €84,000, which is a fairly pitiable amount of money in the context of the destruction that has been done. How does one compensate people who have died during the long wait for justice? How does one compensate people who have taken their own lives? It is not a question of compensation but of a tangible recognition and acknowledgement by the State that it did wrong to those people, and that its attitude in the aftermath of the Louise O'Keeffe case was coldly and determinedly adversarial. They need an element of closure and they need it as a matter of urgency. Anybody who is familiar with the effect on the lives of the victims will find a tangled tale of broken lives, broken homes, broken relationships, broken dreams and broken marriages. That has been the consequence of the abuse they suffered when they were entrusted by the State, which took no oversight responsibilities, into the care of people who abused them. Those people deserve justice. They have suffered too long and they have suffered too much.

Yesterday in this House, the Taoiseach acknowledged, verbally at least, that the State had failed these people and had failed them on more than one occasion. He gave his word to this House that they will not be failed again. I hope the Taoiseach means what he said and I can assure him that we will try to ensure he adheres rigidly to that promise. The victims deserve no less.

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