Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator Boyhan for his comments and leadership in this area. As he said, this is a significant moment. We are one stage away from passing this legislation and finally and conclusively dealing with the wrongful denial of people's identity rights over many decades in this State. In this legislation, we have finally found a way to provide a right for each person to full and unredacted access to all of his or her information. For decades now, this has been striven for. That right is nothing less than people who were adopted, who were subject to illegal birth registration or who were boarded out deserve. This Bill today represents a very significant part of the redress that the Irish State is making for its failure towards children and women over decades since the foundation of our State.

I thank all the Senators for their engagement. The Bill we are passing today is a stronger and better Bill than that which I brought into this House in May. That improvement is because of the input, engagement and passion of Members of Seanad Éireann.

In particular, I thank the Senators who are members of the Oireachtas joint committee and who have been engaged with this process for a very long time. I join Senator Boyhan in thanking my officials for their fantastic work and the wider members of my team.

Finally, I thank every adopted person, everyone who was subject to an illegal birth registration or everyone who was boarded out who has engaged in the process of developing this legislation but more particularly everyone who has engaged directly with me since I took this particular office. I hope this law and the processes that flow from it will give each and every one of those persons the answers they have sought for such a long time.