Liam Fitzgerald (Fianna Fail)

The leader of the Labour Party commented that the resignation of Ms Justice Laffoy from the commission would cause more people to take their cases to the High Court rather than the redress board. That there is no connection between the work of the commission and the redress board seems to have escaped his notice, or did it? Perhaps it has not escaped his notice but he is doing his best to make political capital out of this sensitive issue. If that is the case, it displays an appalling lack of responsibility in a national party leader.

Other members of the same party commented that the redress board is not working well. I was not sure how to respond to this claim so I inquired for myself. I discovered that 97% of the awards made by the redress board have been accepted by the applicants without appeal. Surely that speaks for itself.

I have heard it said, inside and outside the Houses, that people who receive an award from the redress board are at risk of losing that award if they speak in public about their experience of being abused. This has been trumpeted time and again in the past couple of weeks. I checked this claim and found that the contrary is true. The redress scheme is based on medical evidence and involves no finding of abuse. Consequently, if recipients of payments from the redress board speak in public about the payment being proof of the fact that they were abused by a specific person, they could be sued for defamation by that person. It would be a travesty if someone were to be successfully sued in those circumstances. The advice given to abuse victims is cautionary and is given in their own interests. To characterise the position as being otherwise – and it has been so characterised on numerous occasions recently – or to use it as a basis to criticise the redress board is an abominable disgrace.

I welcome the appointment of Mr. Seán Ryan as chairperson designate of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse. I wish him well in his task and in the review of the investigation committee. I hope the result of that review will be an improved process. The need for a different type of investigative process does not reflect on Ms Justice Laffoy, who has shown enormous dedication and commitment to the task of chairing the commission over the past number of years. Notwithstanding that, the Houses of the Oireachtas must face up to their responsibilities as a Legislature. We must not shy away from the issue of the commission's investigation committee needing reform. We have a duty to face up to that issue. The investigation committee has not made anything like the progress of the confidential committee, which has heard more than 700 witnesses and is already two thirds of the way through its task.