Jim Walsh (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Like others, I commend the three Senators who introduced this Bill. As Senator Barrett mentioned, it is a good example of cross-bench collaboration, placing the Seanad in a different light than the unfortunately dysfunctional Dáil. It is also good that we have Senator Power, who has shown great courage in giving testimony on her circumstances, Senator van Turnhout, who has operated in the field of children, and Senator Healy Eames. I will revert to them in a minute.

I will set out two guiding principles to policy on this matter, namely, the integrity of identity and the best interests of the child. The latter are often expounded, but are more honoured in breach than in adherence. As Senator Power stated, they must be balanced with the interests of adoptive parents. When people adopt children, take them into their homes and give them wonderful lives that they would not have been able to access otherwise, it is a wonderful example of Christianity in practice. Like all parents, they make necessary sacrifices in the interests of their children's well being. It is important that this balance has been emphasised in the Bill.

Reference has been made to secretive, forced adoptions. They undoubtedly occurred. For various and sometimes simplistic reasons, people often place all of the blame for this on the religious institutions. They are certainly responsible for an element of what happened, but I would not like to take from the good people who worked in those institutions, for example, the Good Shepherd Convent in New Ross. As I have articulated in recent years, some people emerged from institutions with bad experiences, but I also know of many who emerged with nothing but the height of praise and support for the people who looked after them. Some of the nuns were outstanding in the care they gave children. Obviously, not everyone reached the standard to which they should have been aspiring and there were many unchristian practices.

However, let us not take from the fact that those children were often put up for adoption due to parental pressure. As misguided as it was, that pressure may have stemmed from people's misconceptions about what was in the best interests of their own children, namely, the mothers of the babies. Poverty certainly played a part, as did the valley of the squinting windows where, like the Pharisees, people were harsh in judging others as having fallen below what they felt was the standard. Often, they did not reach that standard in their own lives.

I am inclined to mention a meeting that we held last week. I have been working on a Bill on sperm donations for a while. Dr. Joanna Rose visited Leinster House. Throughout her life, she campaigned to try to establish her true identity and, as we are trying to seek in this debate, the records of adoptive children. She took a successful court case in England. Unlike the Senators who have shown courage and initiative in introducing this Bill, the British politicians who were contacted did not raise the matter in the House of Commons. It was left to the courts to determine in her favour. She discovered that her father, who had been a student, was a sperm donor and that she had between 200 and 300 siblings. She subsequently sought to identify her father. I understand that he is a senior executive with Monsanto. When she contacted him, he responded with a solicitor's letter.

It has been stated that our past is shameful, uncaring and unchristian. It did not meet the guiding principles that I set out at the start. However, it is a good line along which we can reflect on our shameful present. Secretive and forced adoptions are being replaced by secretive and forced abortions. Ms Philomena Lee's story is sad. After searching tirelessly, it is unfortunate that she only discovered her son's identity after he had died and been buried. The Philomena Lees of today will not have the opportunity to make contact with their children because of the prevalence of abortion in the Western world. While I support the Bill fully, we should examine my concern with it on Committee Stage, namely, that we should not introduce the unintended consequence of mothers adopting the modern and shameful practice of abortion out of a fear that their identities might be exposed. We should try to avoid that. The Bill is a step in the right direction and I hope that the Minister will see it all the way through to its enactment. People should and will have an entitlement to their identities. This is everyone's human right.