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

I have spoken at some length about the purpose of the Act and, in particular, the purpose of the reporting, both in the initial report and the final report. In light of that, I am not in a position to accept these amendments. While it is not explicitly stated in the Bill, the information that is referred to in amendment No. 110 will be gathered by the scheme as a matter of course as applications to the scheme will result in the notice of determination and the data will be captured on applications that were unsuccessful. It is likely that this information will be referenced in the annual report from the scheme, which is required under section 12, and also in the review of the operation of the scheme under section 49. Therefore, I will ask my officials in consultation with the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel to review this section and also section 12 which relates to the annual report, and to explore what is feasible to make them more explicit in relation to such data and it being made available in both reports. If necessary, and if we can find a way to do so, we will look to bring in an amendment on Report Stage to reflect the availability of the information in amendment No. 110.

While I cannot accept amendments Nos. 112 and 114, I would like to speak to some of the matters raised within them. In respect of amendment No. 112, the payment rates for the scheme were modelled on the approach taken in the Magdalen restorative justice ex-gratiascheme and, prior to the introduction of the Bill to the Houses, I secured Government agreement to improve the overall approach to payments in the Bill by introducing a more refined set of bands. These more refined bands, which are defined by reference to days and are supplemented by additional quarterly rate bands, will serve to benefit applicants particularly where they would have been at the upper end of a given annual band under the original proposal. I also introduced into the Bill periods of temporary absence of up to 180 days which can be included when calculated the total duration of a person's time in the relevant institution and their corresponding financial payment. Again, this recognises that many mothers and children, spent time outside the institutions, for example as a result of a hospital stay. The inclusion of such periods of temporary absence will also have the effect of increasing the payment amounts to which some applicants will be entitled.In respect of the payment approach, and we have discussed this matter at some length, the scheme does not provide for individualised assessments which will be necessary to provide a response to most of the matters that are listed in amendment No. 114. The approach taken was to eliminate the need for applicants to bring forward evidence of abuse and to demonstrate an entitlement or undergo cross-examination of this evidence, which, by its nature, can be adversarial and re-traumatising.

As mentioned in response to previous amendments, section 50 of the Bill provides for the insertion of additional institutions into Schedule 1 by regulation and with the agreement of the Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform in accordance with certain criteria.

During our most recent session, we discussed the matter of training for staff of the executive office and I have asked my officials to consider that in respect of this report on the operation of the scheme and the annual report under section 12. In consultation with the Office of the Parliamentary Council, we are looking to examine the feasibility of including a reference in the Act that reports under sections 12 and 49 should include a section to cover the training delivered to staff and identify further training and development improvements as appropriate.