Mary Seery Kearney (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I want to clarify what I think I am hearing from the Minister, which is that we are creating a redress scheme that responds to a multitude of things. In particular, the stigma that arises from an Irish society that sent women into a mother and baby institution, be it in some guises and instances that was a county home. In others it was clearly a mother and baby home. The labelling is different, but the experience of that stigma, prejudice and everything else was the same. There will be women who went into a maternity service and then went into the county home afterwards, who will come within the remit and the definition here. There may also be other women who experienced the stigma. They went in to the maternity service. Their child was removed from them and they went home. They will not come within this. Is that what we are saying? I think we can backdate. We can overcome the issues of someone going into the maternity service first and then into the county home. We can cover this commencement date. We can deal with all of that in the backwards and forwards. However, there will be that group of women who experience that societal stigma. They had a child, were not allowed to nurture their own child and were separated from it because of Irish society, prejudice and the times they lived in. They will not come within this scheme. Is that where we are at cut off? I can argue the waiver and will probably be on the same page as the Minister later on with a lot of things. If I am in that category and I do not come under the scheme I will not be signing the waiver, and I will be entitled to do certain things. That is a row for another day, as to the Statute of Limitations and all of that. We have that situation.