Ned O'Sullivan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House. Like everybody else in the House and across the country, I am greatly saddened and upset at the revelations in Tuam. The treatment of young mothers and their children defies belief. It is chilling and horrendous. My sympathy is with the families concerned and my hope is that they will gain some solace from the huge outpouring of support they have received from the public, from Uachtarán na hÉireann down to the ordinary citizen. Outrageous as the story is, Tuam is far from unique. We can anticipate further similar revelations in the immediate future.

It is regrettable that the Bon Secours order, which has a splendid record in the provision of medical services generally and which is today at the cutting edge of medical care, should, as yet, have issued no apology statement in this matter. I urge it to do so now. I welcome and support the statement by my party leader, Deputy Micheál Martin, calling for the religious orders to hand over medical-related properties to the State. This seems even more appropriate in the context of Tuam. The orders got off fairly lightly in the 2002 deal and the Government should now revisit that settlement, especially as the orders did not live up to their undertakings. On the Order of Business this morning, the Leader said it was a Fianna Fáil Government which made that agreement, which I accept. However, times have moved on and we know a great deal more now than we knew in 2002. Let us not be political about this.

While I say I am disturbed by the revelations, I cannot say I am shocked. Anybody who grew up in rural Ireland in the 1950s, as I did, and who had eyes and ears knew there was a strange, silent issue to do with the plight of unmarried mothers which never received public utterance but was in the consciousness at all times. As such, I am not shocked.

I use my remaining time to share a story with the House. It concerns a sad and dark time in Ireland and it will have resonance given the subject under discussion today. In February 1946, in a small cottage at the edge of my home town in north Kerry, a young, single girl gave birth to a baby with the assistance of a local midwife. Complications set in and immediate medical help was required. A local hackney man by the name of John Guerin was sent for and he brought the seriously ill girl to the local hospital, less than a mile from her home. She was refused admittance and directed to the county hospital in Tralee, which entailed an agonising journey for her of 20 miles. Although she was at death's door, she was again refused admittance in Tralee and redirected to the union in Killarney, which was a further 20 miles away and which was considered to be a more suitable place for her peer group. There, she died.

Mr. Guerin took her coffin back to Listowel on the roof of his car to find the gates of our parish church locked against them. The local convent chapel door was locked as well. By this time, word had spread and a sizeable crowd of angry people had gathered in our square. Mr. Guerin and his neighbours broke down the chains on the church and shouldered the remains up to the altar. Community pressure was applied and the girl's body was buried in consecrated ground the following day. Many years later, Mr. Guerin's son, Tony, a celebrated playwright, wrote a play about that story called "Solo Run", which ran to packed houses in Dublin.He also wrote "Hummin'", a play which deals with the way orphan boys from workhouses were treated as slave labour in the locality. A local balladeer, Sean McCarthy, who wrote "Shanagolden", also wrote a beautiful poem, In Shame, about the incident. It highlighted the plight of the unmarried mother of the time.

They whisper their stories, they glance with the eye

They look over my shoulder when I pass them by

And my father and mother, they treat me the same

Oh hear the nightingale crying in shame love in shame

I will leave it at that, except to state there is a positive message in the story of human compassion against oppression and cruelty. A local community, working people in the main, had the courage to stand up to the might of the church and the narrow mean attitudes that obtained at the time when a girl in trouble had nowhere to go except England or the nearest Magdalen home.

I will not join the queue of people pointing the finger at priests and nuns. I admire most of the priests and nuns I know. They have given fantastic service at home in their communities, particularly those who worked and struggled abroad in the missions. They deserve our support and understanding at this time because there has been a lot of comment, most of it justified, but in my view some of the comments, particularly by the clergy in general, have been over the top. That said, I believe all human life is sacred. Therefore, I have great difficulty in understanding why those who shout loudest today about being pro-life were totally silent when the babies of single mothers were consigned to oblivion and misery and, as we have seen, horror of horrors, the septic tank.