Mary White (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I compliment the Minister. She is a colleague and friend and I knew that she would do a good job and she knows that I have complete faith in her. She sat on a committee with former Minister and Deputy, Mrs. Mary O'Rourke, and with our former Seanad colleague, Maria Corrigan, who did great work. I also acknowledge the work done by the late Brian Lenihan. It was the Fianna Fáil Party that first appointed a Minister of State with responsibility for children which drew attention to the need for children's voices to be heard.

As the Minister has said, the referendum is for all of the children, particularly the most vulnerable and most at risk. It is about treating all children equally, particularly by the removal of adoption inequalities. It is about protecting children from abuse and neglect by placing their protection at the centre of decision making. It is about supporting families by reaffirming and underpinning early intervention and family support services to protect children in their homes. It is about recognising children in their own right. I also acknowledge the work done by Senator Jillian van Turnhout as chief executive of the Children's Rights Alliance.

People have said that there is no need for a referendum and that children rights' issues could be dealt with through legislation passed in the Dáil and the Seanad. I do not believe that the Constitution has failed children but we must upgrade it because of the systematic failure by the State and its treatment of children. The Ryan report, the Murphy report and various reports on dioceses around the country have shamed Ireland around the world. The way that thousands of Irish children were sexually abused, raped, physically abused and mentally abused has brought shame on this country. That is the reason we must amend the Constitution.

The Ryan report demonstrated beyond doubt that the entire system treated children more like inmates and slaves rather than people with legal rights and human potential. It also demonstrated that some religious orders and officials encouraged ritual beatings and there is no doubt that in certain institutions the ill-treatment of children was endemic.

We debated the Ryan report in the Seanad.

It was clear from the report that children who ended up in industrial schools or institutions were generally from poorer families in society. They ended up in the courts for some minor misdemeanour in front of judges who were cold-hearted and lacked compassion for children who were poor. The officials from the then Department of Education closed their eyes during their inspections of these institutions and did not investigate thoroughly what was happening in these institutions. The religious orders covered up and continued until this very day to cover up and try to protect the reputation of the Catholic Church rather than protecting the children who were in their care.

Let me repeat, this is our holocaust. We cannot ignore the fact that even at this time Irish children are being abused. The Ryan report conducted an investigation from 1936 until the present day. We know that thousands upon thousands of children were abused. I have serious concerns about the vetting system. I do not want to go into the cases of the 6,500 children in care, but based on previous experience we can be sure that predators who are ruthless, cold and cynical continue to abuse children. I believe that Members have become immune to their plight. When the content of Ryan and Murphy reports first came into the public arena, we were traumatised. I noticed that when the reports on the abuse in the different dioceses around the country, there was no similar emotional reaction to them. People became indifferent to it. There was not much discussion in the Seanad on the reason for holding this referendum or from where the momentum came for it. My colleague, Senator Diarmuid Wilson reminded us of the children who were abused. Senator Aideen Hayden drew attention to the treatment of Irish women in the Magdalene laundries. On account of the way Irish children were treated by brutal predators, I wonder why more children have not been murdered.

I am very emotional about this issue, in contrast to the matter of fact discussion on the technicalities. We are discussing the failure of human beings, members of the Catholic Church who were supposed to be exemplary in their behaviour as Christians, yet were cynical, cold-hearted and ruthless in the treatment of children who were in their care.

I visited the small village of Letterfrack, where the then Letterfrack industrial school is located in beautiful physical surroundings. I visited the graveyard in which many of the children who died while in care in this institution were buried. I experienced a cold and sinister feeling, knowing that these children who died in care had led sad and unfulfilling lives, generally speaking because they were poor.