Holly Cairns (Cork South West, Social Democrats)
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518. To ask the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth if he will provide details from the records available to his Department of the number of persons who spend less than six months in mother and baby homes or county homes for the time period covered by the Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme Bill 2022. [53582/22]

Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party)
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As part of the work undertaken by the Interdepartmental Group on the development of the Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme, it was estimated that approximately 19,500 mothers spent time in a Mother and Baby or County Home Institution, with just under 15,000 of these mothers spending less than six months there. In the case of people who spent time as institutions as children, it was estimated that of the approximately 38,500 people concerned, 24,000 spent less than six months in an institution.

Therefore, in total, an estimated 39,000 spent less than 6 months as mothers or children in Mother and Baby or County Home Institutions. More detailed information can be found in the Report of the Interdepartmental Group (IDG) on the development of the Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme, published in November 2021, in particular at Table 4 on page 71 of the report. The report is available via the following link www.gov.ie/en/publication/0c637-mother-and-baby-institutions-payment-scheme/#idg-report.