Maire Devine (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The report on the mother and baby homes published today is the fifth interim report and we have watched each one, as have the relatives of the women in the mother and baby homes. They have stuck with this over the years and many of them are now elderly and frail. Some have sadly passed on without learning what happened to their children, their brothers, sisters and even their mothers. The uncovering of the shame that is and was Ireland continues. Every layer that we lift on the past brings more horrors for us to bear. We expect it now, I think, because we have got so used to it.

The bodies of almost 1,000 children aged between 10 minutes and 15 years were given, from the Dublin institutions alone, to medical schools. Questions arise about where their remains are buried, whether a burial ever took place and whether it was a proper burial. These children had one thing in common, they were poor people, often termed illegitimate and called anatomical subjects. They were given to medical schools throughout the country and it was common practice at the time in other countries. There are 900 burials that cannot be figured out in Bessborough. They do not know where these children and infants have gone, they are somewhere in the grounds and trying to establish where is a mighty task. Could the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs come in to update us on this distressing report and to confirm for the families the due date of the final report which she has said will be next February?