Billy Timmins (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Question 47: To ask the Minister for Health and Children her plans to establish a new inquiry into allegations of child abuse of intellectually disabled children in two facilities operated by the Brothers of Charity in Galway arising from the serious inadequacies in the original investigation, McCoy Report, Western Health Board, 2007 as highlighted by the Hynes Report, Department of Health and Children, 2009; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [41895/10]

John Moloney (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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have no plans to establish a new inquiry into the allegations referred to. The matters highlighted in the original investigation by the Western Health Board (the McCoy Report) and in the Hynes Report completed for my Department, were addressed in statements made by officials of my Department and the HSE to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children on 29th June 2010, in the context of the Committee's consideration of the report of the Irish Human Rights Commission into the operation of one of the facilities concerned. In view of the recommendations of the IHRC Report, consider that our priority going forward should be to focus our efforts on ensuring that models of service and care for people with intellectual disabilities are operated with appropriate safeguards and that unsuitable, congregated residential facilities are phased out as quickly as possible in favour of more appropriate community based settings. These issues are being taken into consideration in the preparation of a policy review which is currently underway in my Department in the context of the Value for Money & Policy Review of Disability Services.