Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I join my colleagues in congratulating Bridget. I am glad that I was on the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission when the appointment was made.

Many people have already addressed the situation in Tuam. I was brought up in Galway in the 1960s, under the tyranny of the famous Bishop Browne, where young girls who found themselves pregnant were sent away on holidays and were not pregnant when they came back. My colleague, Senator Bacik, hit the nail on the head. There are tens of thousands of fathers wandering around this country who took no responsibility whatsoever for what they delivered. I wonder how many are hanging their heads in shame today.

There are also thousands of mothers who gave up their children or were forced to do so. Some believed that they were adopted. I saw an article in the paper yesterday about a woman saying she believed her brother was not buried in Tuam, but might in fact have been adopted in America. Can we even stop to think about the pain those women are going through today as they wonder whether they had a child buried in Tuam or sent somewhere else for adoption? There is not a Member of this House, any other House, or any establishment in this country that has not been touched by this dirty little secret.

It was a dirty little secret. I am aware, with regard to my own family, of a farm being taken off a girl because she became pregnant after her husband died. The children were sent to orphanages. This is the kind of country that we lived in and it is time that we pull back the covers and have a look at what went on in this dirty little country.By the way, it was not only the church that was involved. As my colleague Senator Victor Boyhan said, everybody was involved, including doctors, social workers, teachers and nurses, as well as parents because it was they who delivered their daughters to these establishments. Therefore, when we talk about this issue, let us talk openly and honestly about it.