Niall Ó Donnghaile (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 116:

In page 35, lines 16 to 20, to delete all words from and including “(1) The” in line 16 down to and including line 20 and substitute the following:

“(1) The Chief Deciding Officer, in consultation with the Minister may, by regulation, provide for the insertion in Schedule 1 of any institution which was established for the purpose of providing maternity and infant care services and the placement of children for the purposes of adoption or care arrangements, and in respect of which a public body had a regulatory or inspection function.”.

I will speak briefly to the amendment. I am sure the Minister will not be surprised by my remarks because they are consistent with the approach that I and my Sinn Féin and other colleagues in the House have taken. The amendment speaks for itself in terms of what it tries to do regarding the placement of children in respect of which public body had a regulatory or inspection function in terms of an institution. The amendment seeks to try to address the broader issues of concern that have been relayed to us and the Minister around the Bill creating a tier of victimhood, which should be a concern for everyone. The six-month period is entirely arbitrary. It is also not consistent with other similar schemes, something which was alluded to by other colleagues in the other stages of this debate. The eggshell skull rule means that we take a victim as we find them. There is nothing that says that someone is less traumatised because of the particular institution they were in or, indeed, a particular period they happened to spend in an institution, regardless of how short or long that period was.

The amendment seeks to amend the Bill to the effect that the chief deciding officer, in consultation with the Minister, may, by regulation, provide for the insertion in Schedule 1 of any institution that was established for the purpose of providing maternity and infant care services and the placement of children for the purposes of adoption or care arrangements and in respect of which a public body had a regulatory or inspection function. This seeks to ensure that all victims, no matter what institution they found themselves in or how long they were in one, are supported and their needs met as the Bill progresses through the House.