Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator Boyhan for raising this huge issue. Before I came in I took the opportunity to look back at some of the debate in the House on the Ryan report, which revealed the full horrors of what happened in residential institutions where sexual abuse was reported to be endemic in boys' institutions and physical and emotional abuse and neglect were routine. Members of the congregations who were perpetrators of abuse were never reported to the Garda and cases were managed with a view to protecting the institution and not the children. Children were not believed when they reported incidences. The Department of Education and Skills comes out extremely badly from the report because it did not inspect effectively, it ignored problems which were revealed and it ignored recommendations to respond. As the Senator has said, these were children who often had been entrusted to the congregations by the State. We can only imagine how vulnerable a child was who had been taken away from his or her parents by the State and entrusted to such an institution.

This is the backdrop to the Residential Institutions Redress Board, which was established in 2002 under the Residential Institutions Redress Act 2002 to make fair and reasonable payments to those who, as children, were abused while resident in 139 scheduled institutions. To date, the redress board has made in the order of 15,600 awards. Overall expenditure at the end of 2016 was €1.239 billion. At this stage, the work of the board is largely complete. It has dealt with all applications and at present no remaining applications are on hand. A number of judicial review applications are still before the courts and they will have to be dealt with before they are resolved.

The Senator referred to the indemnity agreement. Eighteen of the religious congregations entered an indemnity agreement in 2002, and agreed to provide a collective contribution of €128 million, comprising cash, counselling services and property. Work is continuing to complete the legal requirements to finalise the transfer of the remaining 11 properties. I understand that €113 million has been realised and the remainder is being worked through. It is worth noting that most of the properties are already in use by the intended recipients.

Significantly, today the Comptroller and Auditor General will publish a report on the scheme. It is worth recalling that after the Ryan report was published a commitment was made by the congregations to make an additional contribution of €350 million. Today, the Comptroller and Auditor General will report not only on the indemnity scheme but also on the commitments with regard to the €350 million. The report confirms that when the withdrawal of one offer previously made is combined with some changes in the valuation of properties previously offered, the total value of the offers currently in place and the contributions already made by the congregations comes to €320 million, of which €209 million has been received.

The report also confirms the total cost of all elements of residential abuse, including the inquiry, the redress scheme and related survivor supports, is €1.518 billion. This means that even if all the offers currently on the table are delivered upon, the religious congregations will have funded 21.1% of the total cost of residential abuse while the State will have funded 78.9%. The contributions and offers made by the congregations relate to the €128 million under the 2002 indemnity agreement and the 2009 voluntary offer of €352 million which has been revised to €192 million of which €96.1 million has been realised.

The 50:50 target between the State and the congregations for meeting the costs of abuse has not been signed up to by the congregations. However, it has been the position of successive Governments that given their responsibility for managing the institutions where horrific and life-altering abuse took place, the congregations should meet 50% of the cost of inquiring into what happened and compensating the victims of that abuse. It is also important to note that, given the contents of the 2002 indemnity agreement signed up to by the then Government, the Government today does not have legal mechanisms open to it to compel religious congregations to meet the 50:50 target or to deliver more rapidly on the voluntary offers made in 2009.

Today’s report by the Comptroller and Auditor General summarises and updates us on the response of the State and the congregations to those events. It makes a number of recommendations for the Department of Education and Skills and the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform in respect of the lessons that have been learned from how this was administered, and all of these have been accepted.

As Minister for Education and Skills I find it very disappointing and frustrating that the organisations responsible for protecting children, which managed the institutions in which these horrendous acts took place, would apparently place so little value on their responsibility. These were institutions where children suffered extremely badly and the organisations have a moral responsibility to live up to the commitments they made. We all know their mission is to protect and serve and uphold moral values, and many ordinary Catholics are dismayed we are not getting closer to seeing these commitments honoured but instead are moving further away. Unfortunately, as a result of agreements put in place by previous Governments we have no legal mechanisms open to us to compel the congregations to meet these targets. Ruairí Quinn, in particular, under the previous Government worked hard in holding meetings and engaging directly with the congregations to seek to put moral pressure on them to deliver on their responsibilities. Unfortunately, after today’s report we have to ask questions as to why organisations with stated missions to serve the public and uphold moral codes apparently place so little importance on these values.