Victor Boyhan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I hear what the Minister is saying but to go back to the point, many of these vaccine trials took place on children from zero up to six months so they are excluded. There is no redress. The Government has no scheme for them. Let us say a list was to be put in front of the Minister in ten days' time with 38 children on it and it was validated that they were all in State care and subject to these trials. In some case it was only placebos and there was no potential risk of damage. There are very extensive records within UCD and other places. This is not a big science. The Department would be aware of correspondence, and I am certainly aware of it. At all times, I made sure that any correspondence that came into my hands was duplicated and that the Department and other people had it. If it came to the attention of the Department that 50 children in 1965, who would be in their late 50s today, were the subject of these vaccine trials, where is the redress? They were in these institutions and can validate all of that through the paperwork etc. but they were left out. There is no redress for them because of this blunt instrument whereby the Government has said there is nothing for zero to six months. A mother could be in an institution for a night and get compensation under this package - that is fact - but a child who was there for five months gets nothing. Yet it is all documented. These trials went right up into the 1970s. They were pretty modern times and records were pretty good. There are very extensive records out there.

While I accept the Minister is not in a position to recommend this here, he could go away and say that the point was taken, if there is undisputed evidence and children can be validated as being in care at that particular juncture and were the subject of vaccine trials. GlaxoSmithKline is prepared, to some extent, to engage and we know that people have engaged with it in terms of information on a one-to-one basis. I just think it is too blunt an instrument if the Government is not going to provide any redress or any support for these people to take any litigation. There is just nothing for them. Do not underestimate the trauma that is inflicted on young children at that early age. There is also the issue of parental consent. Many of these children were not there by the consent of their parents. Many of them were taken from their parent or parents and put in care.

When you are explaining, you are losing. When someone puts a microphone up and asks the Minister why he is excluding children from zero to six months who were the subject, or possibly the subject, of drug trials, what will he say? Will he say this system is not robust enough or that we are not putting in place a system for it? I am going to leave it at that. I hate to argue with the Minister. I have no doubt of his absolute commitment but there is an anomaly there. There is an injustice there and it is something we need to right.