Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate and acknowledge the work of the Social Democrats on this very important motion and thank them for it. I too would like to welcome the people in the Visitors Gallery to Dáil Éireann.

It would be wrong for any of us to be debating or talking about this motion without again acknowledging, as we all rightfully do, the horror and awfulness suffered by the people in these institutions, the time they endured there, the effect it had on their lives, and the fact that many of them may be listening or watching today and taking into account every word that is being said here. It is so important to say how sorry we are that the State left those people down and that it hurt those people when they should have been in care and should have been nurtured and supported but, instead, they were hurt, damaged, harmed, abused and mistreated, and that is so wrong.

On behalf of the Rural Independent Group, I note that one of the key recommendations made by the committee is that the six-month residency requirement for children must be removed. The Rural Independent Group fully endorsed and supported this recommendation. We believe it is imperative that anyone who was resident in one of the institutions should be entitled to a payment, regardless of the time they gave there. That is so important.

It is not about the length of time people were there or whether they were farmed out. They might not have been in the institution at all, but they were still hurt where they went. They should have been under the care of the State, but they were not. For that, we are all humbly sorry. They were let down, they were left behind and they were harmed.

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