Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 17 January 2024
403. Deputy Patrick Costello asked the Minister for Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform given the recent announcement that exhumations are to take place in Mountjoy Prison to recover the remains of executed prisoners buried on site, if his Department will commence a similar scheme of exhumations to take place at Kilmainham Gaol. [1687/24]
View answerRequests such as this are of a very sensitive and delicate nature and there are a number of matters to consider, both in terms of the significant practicalities involved and the ethical issues. While the general area of the site of graves in Kilmainham is relatively well known, there is no detailed plan showing definitively exactly where individuals were interred and even were it to be precisely located, there would be practical issues involved in positively identifying the remains.
Were the OPW to possess the power to institute such a move (which it does not, given the responsibility of the Minister for Heritage under the National Monuments Acts), it would still likely be of such delicacy as to require being considered at the highest levels of Government.
