Ivana Bacik (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House and thank him for those comments. However, it still begs the central question of why the legislation had to be rushed through at such speed. Reflecting on it since our last debate in the Seanad and watching the Dáil debates this week, it has increasingly come home to me that if the commission, as it indeed did, came to the Minister on the basis of its legal advice - which we obviously have not seen - saying it needed this legislation to be put in place, the Minister could have responded that he could not get this legislation passed with due parliamentary process by 30 October and that the commission would have to seek an extension. I do not see why that could not have been done. An extension of a few short weeks would have made the difference where parliamentary process is concerned and would have served to smooth the passage of what the Minister says is necessary technical legislation but which has in fact stirred up such distress and such painful memories, stories and experiences for so many people.

The Minister has been very clear and open about having underestimated the extent to which that would be the case from this Bill. I think that was a very fair comment. When we look back at the anguish which emerged in the debates in this House and in the other House on previous and related legislation, it was foreseeable that it would have this effect, particularly when this Bill will do nothing to improve access to records or information for survivors. That is the crucial point. It will simply facilitate the sealing, the 30-year rule and so on. We know all of that is in the 2004 Act, but that Act is not set in stone and could have been amended. Indeed, the Adoption (Information and Tracing) Bill 2016 could have been brought forward. I tried to ensure it would be brought forward under the Minister's predecessor, Katherine Zappone. For all of those reasons, it is unfortunate, to say the least, that the Bill has been rushed in this way and that an extension was not simply sought and granted to enable a better parliamentary process to go on.

This morning I had a long conversation about this legislation with someone the Minister knows very well - my former Labour colleague, Joan Burton, who is a former Tánaiste. As the Minister knows, Ms Burton has been hugely active on this matter and has really sought to ensure that adopted persons in particular, but also persons who were in mother and baby homes and persons whose family members were in those homes, would have access to information and that privacy rights would not be used to trump their rights to access their own personal data. Having spoken to Ms Burton and, over the years, to survivors and those who support them, including women such as the late and very great Christine Buckley and Carmel McDonnell Byrne and those who work in Barnardos tracing service and the Aislinn Centre, etc., I am aware that for everyone involved in this matter there has been a sense for many years now that the State has blocked access to information. The sense is that we have not been able to adopt suitable legislation for various reasons to do with constitutional legal arguments which should be tested more strongly. Somehow, we have not been able to bring in the sort of gold-standard legislation we have seen in other jurisdictions where adopted people have rights to access their own information and it is just a very clear right and that is unfortunate. We have got a situation where many survivors and family members have been blocked from getting information for many years. This Bill then comes into that context and is seen as simply contributing to the overall culture of secrecy and blockage of information. It is a really important point.

I must say to the Minister that we have been constructive all through this debate on this legislation. I said at the start of Second Stage that the work of the commission is hugely important. I have immense respect for the three members of the commission who are incredibly eminent. We all eagerly await the publication of the 4,000-page report which we know will be groundbreaking. I have quoted some of the interim reports the commission has produced. They have really contributed to our store of knowledge on this issue. Given that the Minister is saying there is such a rush in getting this Bill through, I ask that he publish the report without delay, that we be able to debate it in the Houses and, crucially, that support be given to those organisations providing support to survivors and their families. That need is so clearly evident in the emails, communications, talks and conversations we have all had with so many survivors and survivors' families. I think all of us on the Opposition benches appreciate that in the Seanad - if not in the Dáil - the Minister took some amendments on board and the Bill has been improved as a result. However, we still have fundamental issues with the tenor of the Bill and with the fact that it will not provide persons with access to their own data. That is really the fundamental point which remains a point of contention and of opposition to the legislation.