Clare Daly (Dublin North, Socialist Party)
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108. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills in relation to the fact that a number of concerns have been raised about the State funded groups which claim to represent institutional abuse victims, not actually reflecting the views of survivors, if he will facilitate and attend a national meeting with the survivors of abuse in relation to the statutory fund, the idea of a memorial and the way their files will be dealt with. [47617/13]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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I am aware that there are a range of views among the survivors of institutional abuse. Some 15,000 survivors have received awards from the Residential Institutions Redress Board and some 60% of applications are from survivors living in Ireland.

I have no plans to facilitate a national meeting of survivors as proposed. The legislation establishing the Residential Institutions Statutory Fund followed an extensive consultation process undertaken by my Department, which involved meetings with the religious congregations, groups representing survivors of residential institutional child abuse and a number of other interested parties. Press advertisements invited views, which could be forwarded by post, email or by a Freefone Service, which was operated by Barnardos, on behalf of my Department. A report on the consultation process is available on my Department's website. I also met with groups representing survivors of residential institutional abuse in July 2011, when we discussed the Government's approach to the proposed Statutory Fund.

The Memorial Committee, established to oversee the commissioning of the Memorial, undertook a public consultation process as well as meeting with survivor groups and interested parties, before launching its competition in July 2011.

The Government has agreed in principle to my bringing forward legislative proposals to allow for the retention of the records of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse (CICA), the Residential Institutions Redress Board (RIRB) and the Review Committee, subject to their being sealed for possibly 75 years.