Fintan Warfield (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House. I also welcome the fact that the Bill has been removed from the schedule today. This is a recognition of a clear message from Members that it is not sufficient to provide a clear indiscriminate pathway for adoptive persons and birth parents seeking truth and, even with the proposed amendments, it is still steeped with hurtful stigma. This well of misinformation, mistruth and the guarding of people's rights to their identity is a stain on the State's past. Not only did the church co-ordinate on this, but the State was complicit in hiding the evidence. Not only should the State be beholden to its responsibilities in this regard, it should do its utmost to reconcile the damage it has done and not serve to compound the hurt with overbearing litigation and an ongoing denial of identity rights.

While the Minister has addressed the fact that the Attorney General is insisting on the right of refusal of the birth mother, it is clear that this is discriminatory to adopted people and it writes into statute a clear and unequivocal stigma that says to adopted people, many of whom have spent a lifetime of being let down by the State, that it does not trust them with information pertaining to their own identity and personal data. While I do not believe that is the Government's intention, the Bill needs to be reconsidered in respect of balancing the rights of privacy and the right to one's identity. The Minister's Department has been working on this tirelessly to try to seek the best balance but for those of us who take their lead from the voices of those affected by the Bill, we cannot currently endorse it as it stands. We welcome the Bill being put on hold.

I reiterate that birth registrations have been a matter of public record in Ireland since 1864. The general data protection regulation, GDPR ensures that a person has a right to their own personal information. There is no substantial data to suggest that there is an issue of adoptive people knocking on the door of his or her natural mother's home, without due consideration and there is no substantial data to suggest that there is an imbalance of adopted persons seeking their birth mothers and not vice versa or that there is a requirement to place the birth mother's refusal and only hers in law, which prejudices adopted people. We cannot support the dynamic proposed in this legislation that would only further prolong the hurt and discrimination against adopted people by the State and Sinn Féin cannot support a Bill that contains these proposals.

However, we have taken our lead from adopted people. I welcome the Minister's commitment to continue to engage more with the stakeholders. I have not seen the amendments proposed by Senator Bacik.