Seanad debates

Friday, 2 July 2010

Adoption Bill 2009 [Seanad Bill Amended by the Dáil]: Report and Final Stages

 

11:00 am

Photo of Ciarán CannonCiarán Cannon (Fine Gael)

I congratulate the Minister of State on moving Ireland to the position where it is ready to give effect to the Hague Convention on intercountry adoption. It is a positive step forward and I congratulate him on it. I echo the sentiments of my colleagues who have spoken on the heartbreak suffered by many prospective families. Parents have endured an emotional rollercoaster over the past years and months, particularly the 20 sets of parents to whom Senator Healy Eames referred. They have been on a particularly difficult emotional rollercoaster. At one point, through no fault of the Minister of State, some of the parents received calls from the Minister of State's delegation in Vietnam to say this issue had been resolved. I received a call that evening from one set of parents who were overjoyed at the news and were preparing their home to receive a child on whom they were ready to lavish care, affection and love.

It looks like Vietnam is moving towards giving effect to the Hague Convention. Does the Minister of State have pertinent information on this? If so, will Helping Hands Adoption Mediation Agency remain the agency that processes intercountry adoptions? The Minister of State launched an inquiry into the operation of Helping Hands Adoption Mediation Agency last October. Information I have, which the Minister of State can rebut or confirm, is that the inquiry was given no terms of reference and no end date by which it had to produce a result. In that vacuum, Helping Hands Adoption Mediation Agency commissioned a world-class accountancy firm, Grant Thornton, to carry out a forensic examination of its operation. The latter inquiry proves there is no evidence whatsoever of impropriety on the part of Helping Hands Adoption Mediation Agency. I ask the Minister of State to do everything in his power to take these 20 sets of parents off the emotional rollercoaster and give them some security and real hope that within the next couple of months the children they have been waiting for will finally come to live with them in order to form the family unit they have been waiting so long to form.

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