John Minihan (Progressive Democrats)

When this matter was brought to her attention, the Tánaiste quickly sought legal advice as a result of questions from Senator Browne's party in the Dáil. She rang the Attorney General and since then the process has moved forward at an accelerated pace if one measures it against the preceding 30 years. She stopped the practice immediately when she was told it did not have legal support. She brought forward legislation and admitted, and repeated it in the House this morning, that the legislation she brought forward on the retrospective payments was based on incomplete and inaccurate information. Reading the report one would think that, like the third secret of Fatima, there was some sort of mystery surrounding this that was shared among a few people but not everyone.

The other key point is that the Tánaiste commissioned the Travers report. It is clear she was not briefed on the seriousness of this issue when she took over the portfolio.

With regard to the famous letter we are talking about, which the Tánaiste has indicated she will bring that into the public domain and publish later today, I would be interested to know for whose signature that letter was prepared. If it moved from the Secretary General's office to the ministerial office, was there a memorandum or a cover note to the Minister? These are interesting points because if a letter came to me for signature and I wanted to move it up the line to the Minister, I would do so without putting a memorandum or a covering note on it. These are interesting points and I look forward to seeing that letter later in the day.

In the judgment at section 5.37 of the report, Mr. Travers has clearly outlined the flaws at administrative level and questioned issues at political level. Senator O'Toole clearly set the record straight earlier and gave a good analysis and synopsis of the report in his contribution to the House. The report clearly states that the greater culpability lay at administrative rather than political level. We must be clear about that when we want to play politics with these issues. The report states:

At political level . . . There is, however, no evidence on the files which I have seen in carrying out this examination that any Minister . . . was fully briefed to the required extent on the relevant issues surrounding the problems associated with the long stay care charges. I have pressed, without success, the Department of Health and Children for documentation on any such briefing . . . . The shortcomings of Ministers in this area, however, are at a significantly lesser scale, substance and order of magnitude to that of the system of administration.

Those are key issues.

It is unfortunate that we are in a situation where some 315,000 people have been identified who will be the subject of some form of reimbursement. Also, the approximately 20,000 people who are still alive, going back to 1976, will have to be reimbursed. Whether the Statute of Limitations will be applied in the cases of those who are deceased is a matter for the Government to decide. These are the decisions facing the State and the taxpayers because it is not as if the Government has a chest of funds under the table to meet this bill, which the taxpayer must foot. If that bill reaches the highest figure that has been quoted, namely, approximately €2 billion, that will have major implications for the services provided in this State.

There are two issues on which I wish to comment. I took issue with the inaccuracies uttered earlier by Senator Browne, who is now in the Chair. I did so because in my opinion he was mischievously and vexatiously interpreting material from the report for political reasons. The Senator was wrong to do so. He clearly stated that the file and folder had been placed on the desk of the Minister but the report does not state that this was the case. Senator O'Rourke has clarified the position in that regard. A mistake or a misunderstanding is fine but I interjected because Senator Browne was quoting inaccurately from the report. That was wrong.