Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE) | Oireachtas source

Last week, the Minister wrote to the religious orders to ask them to contribute to the redress process. That is completely unacceptable. Those orders must be compelled to contribute, including by seizing their assets where necessary. The scheme must include all survivors, including women affected after 1973 and women and children who stayed in the homes for less than six months. Survivors must also be entitled to redress for all the harm offered, including from the forced adoptions that the commission incredibly claims never happened, despite all the evidence from survivors.

The Bon Secours Sisters ran the Tuam mother and baby home. That order is the second largest provider of private healthcare in the State, with revenue in 2019 of more than €300 million, including €5 million in public funding. Will the Minister compel that order to provide redress? Will he nationalise the hospitals owned by the Bon Secours order and bring them into the public health service? The religious orders identified in the report also include the Sisters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, which ran homes where thousands of children died and thousands of women and children were forcibly separated. Disgracefully, that order is still refusing to disclose where the Bessborough bodies are buried, while ploughing ahead with plans to sell off lands reportedly valued at €10 million. On top of that, representatives from that order make up the entire board of the Bessborough Centre, which, according to its website, "continues the work started by the sisters in 1922". The centre receives State funding, including from the Crisis Pregnancy Agency. Is that not wildly inappropriate?

In 2021, well over 90% of our primary schools and a large majority of our secondary schools are under the control of the Catholic Church. Many students are denied access to objective, factual and inclusive sex education. Is it not beyond time to finally separate church and State and institute a comprehensive system of redress for survivors? The seizure and redistribution of assets must be a first step in this long overdue process.

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