Gary Gannon (Dublin Central, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

In the brief time available, I wish to touch on two aspects of the Minister's opening statement. He referenced the interdepartmental group which will assess the provision of a form of enhanced medical card to everyone who spent more than six months in mother and baby institutions. I join Deputy Sherlock in urging the Minister to lift the six-month limit. The trauma of those who spent a week or a month in those institutions is no less than the trauma of those who spent more than six months there. A reduction in that time limit would be massively welcome.

Another issue is the type of medical card that will be made available to survivors of mother and baby homes. In that context, we already have a gold standard as recommended on foot of a previous apology to the survivors of Magdalen laundries. The first recommendation of Mr. Justice John Quirke was that survivors of Magdalen laundries would receive the Health (Amendment) Act 1996 card, known as the HAA card. This card entitles the bearer to a wide variety of provisions including access to both public and private healthcare. If one believes in the State then one must acknowledge that Governments become custodians of promises made by their predecessors. The Minister and the Taoiseach apologised last week but they have become custodians of apologies that were made previously. Shamefully, the recommendation of Mr. Justice Quirke has yet to be fulfilled. The suggestion that a full HAA card be available to all victims and survivors of Ireland's institutional past is extremely worthy and should be seriously considered. The card would entitle survivors, victims and their family members to a full counselling service, alternative therapies, a complete range of dental services and a full range of chiropody services. These are just some of the entitlements under the HAA card.

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