Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 26 January 2022
1. Deputy Mary Lou McDonald asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the investigation being carried out by the Secretary General of his Department into the leaking of details of the mother and baby homes commission of investigation final report in advance of its publication in 2021. [61494/21]
View answer2. Deputy Jennifer Murnane O'Connor asked the Taoiseach the status of the investigation being carried out by the Secretary General of his Department into the leaking of details of the mother and baby homes commission of investigation final report in January 2021. [1874/22]
View answer3. Deputy Alan Kelly asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the status of the investigation by the Secretary General of his Department into the leaking of details of the final report of the mother and baby homes commission of investigation in advance of its publication. [3310/22]
View answer4. Deputy Mick Barry asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the investigation being carried out by the Secretary General of his Department into the leaking of details of the mother and baby homes commission of investigation final report in advance of its publication in 2021. [3615/22]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 1 to 4, inclusive, together.
In advance of consideration of the final report of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes and certain related matters by the Government, certain information relating to the report was disclosed in a newspaper report. In that context, I requested that an investigation be carried out. The investigation is being undertaken by a senior official in my Department and is being done in the context of a broader examination of the overall arrangements that are in place for the management of documents for Government meetings and the protection of their confidentiality. That process is ongoing.
What I can say is the Government is very clearly focused on making progress with the comprehensive action plan we have set out for the survivors and former residents. As the Deputies are aware, on 13 January 2021 last, I apologised on behalf of the Irish Government to those who spent time in a mother and baby home or a county home. The Government engaged with the groups and published an action plan for survivors and former residents of mother and baby and county home institutions on 16 November 2021. This plan recognises the failures of the past, acknowledges the hurt that continues to be felt by survivors, and seeks to rebuild a relationship of trust between the State and those who have been so gravely wronged.
The 22 actions set out in the action plan have been developed to respond to the broadest range of needs and wishes that survivors have expressed. Actions have been arranged into central themes that have emerged as fundamental in how the Government responds. These are: a survivor-centred approach, a formal State apology, access to personal information, enduring archive and database development, education and research, memorialisation, restorative recognition, and dignified burial.
Central to the development of each of these actions has been detailed and sustained engagement with survivors and their families. The establishment of the mother and baby institutions payment schemes will provide financial payments and an enhanced medical card to defined groups in acknowledgement of suffering experienced while resident in a mother and baby home and county home institution. The State will fund the scheme and it is estimated that it will cost approximately €800 million. The Government intends to seek contributions towards the cost of the scheme from the religious congregations that were involved in operating the institutions. The legislation required to establish the scheme is currently being developed as a matter of priority and it is intended that the scheme will open for applications as soon as possible in 2022.
As the Deputies know, on 12 January last, the Government published the Birth Information and Tracing Bill 2022. It passed Second Stage in this House last week and has been referred to the select committee for detailed examination.
Separately, the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth has taken possession of the archive of the commission of investigation and has established a dedicated information management unit to lead on the management of the commission's archive, including applications for access to these records. A professional archivist has been appointed to work within the unit to focus on the preservation of and public access to these records.
The draft certain institutional burials (authorised interventions) Bill underwent pre-legislative scrutiny in the first half of 2021 and the joint committee published its report on 15 July. It was clear from engagement with survivors and former residents that memorialisation was considered to be a very important part of the healing process for those affected. The Government also acknowledges that memorialisation plays a role in helping to remove the stigma and shame that has deeply affected so many. The commitment to a national memorial and records centre will be progressed by means of a group chaired by the Secretary General to the Government. Funding has been secured to support this process, which will develop an overarching vision and proposed approach for the creation of the national centre and which will be brought to Government for approval.
We have 11 minutes remaining and I suggest we will have one minute per question if we are to get through all of this business.
A year has now passed since the Minister, Deputy O’Gorman, wrote to the Secretary General of the Taoiseach’s Department seeking an investigation into the leaking to the media of the commission’s final report. The failure to conclude this investigation has been described by survivors and their families as another broken promise in a long litany of broken promises from the current and former Governments. The Taoiseach’s response on this delay is not acceptable. He gave a commitment to investigate this leak. Survivors, their families and those of us who represent them here were repeatedly told the process is ongoing without providing any detail of what that statement actually means. It was the decision of the Taoiseach to tag this investigation on to a broader examination of multiple Cabinet leaks. If this particular examination cannot be completed in a reasonable timeframe, then it is time to separate this out from the rest of these. This dithering and delay is in the context of the Government having to accept and acknowledge in the High Court that the commission of investigation treated witnesses unlawfully and the release of a redress scheme based on findings and recommendations that have been utterly discredited. Let me repeat that - utterly discredited.
The following is owed to the survivors and families: an explanation as to why this is taking so long, clarity on what date the Secretary General will conclude this work, and a firm commitment to publish the findings.
I also have the same question. The survivors were very upset over the leak of the report into mother and baby homes. I would like to know where we are today in the investigation of that leak. People want closure. I ask that we get that out to people. There is a very significant issue here with communication and I know how committed the Taoiseach is to this.
The other issue I wish to address, and I was glad he raised it, is the 22 recommendations, the redress and the medical cards. These are so important for survivors. As the Taoiseach is aware, the survivors are getting older and we need to move on this as soon as possible. I ask that he does that.
This is just extraordinary. An investigation was ordered into the leak. The Taoiseach tagged it onto a bigger investigation. We have no date as to when the report will be done. This was so damaging to the families and survivors and had a very significant impact. The contents were in the media days in advance.
Let us get to the bottom of the following. Will the Taoiseach tell the House when this investigation is over? If he cannot find out what happened, he should just say that, as bad as that would be. These people deserve closure. If he cannot find out what happened or, dare I say it, some people may not want to say what happened, that would be wrong but at least it would bring some form of closure. The idea that this can just rumble on and on is just another slap in the face to the families and the survivors. Will the Taoiseach at least tell us today the date, once and for all - he has the power, he is the Taoiseach, and it is his Department - by which this will be concluded?
We are one year on now. Survivors deserve an answer as to what happened with the leaking of this information. When are they going to get it? The failure to provide answers is adding insult to injury. The redress scheme has already excluded many people from it, including people who were born and lived in the institutions for less than six months. These people were profoundly affected by what happened to them and have been cut off from the scheme. It is divisive and is an attempt on the part of the Government to play a game of divide and rule. We heard fine speeches in the Dáil last week about violence against women and what the Government was going to do.
This was State violence against women. Why does the Government force these people to go out onto the streets and outside the gates of Leinster House in all weathers to campaign for justice on this issue? They need answers now.
The mother and baby home regime was organised abuse of mothers and children by the church and State. They have been cruelly let down time and again by the State. The commission report was an absolute travesty, as I said from the start, in that it failed to take on board in a serious way, and give way to, the voices of the survivors. However, the leak was a disgrace. Government spin came before the needs of the survivors and their right to see that report before journalists and everybody else. A year later is the Taoiseach seriously not just pulling our legs when he says that he has not come to a conclusion as to how the leak happened and that somehow it has got tied up in some wider discussion about Cabinet confidentiality? That is an insult. Is there going to be a cover-up of this leak or are we going to get a conclusion? Can the Taoiseach also end the further insult of the arbitrary six-month date for acknowledging the pain, abuse and wrong that was done to everybody who went through the mother and baby home system?
I feel I am the one to point out that the emperor has no clothes here. The Taoiseach was quoted extensively in the article which carried the details of the leaked report. He was quoted as saying that he found the report shocking and difficult to read and he confirmed he would be making an apology to the survivors on behalf of the State and wider society. At the very least he had a conversation with the journalist, Jody Corcoran, on the Saturday. What did the Taoiseach do upon finding out that the Sunday Independent had a copy of this report? Did he contact his colleagues immediately and say there was a crisis situation in that this important report which should be in the hands of survivors had got into the media? What did he do about it at that stage when he knew a leak had occurred? Did he take emergency measures and say that the Government needed to get it into the hands of survivors to ensure there was no attempt to have spin at that stage? No, obviously he did not. Can there be an external investigation of the leak, as opposed to this managed process by the Department of the Taoiseach that has, unsurprisingly, failed to find the culprit?
It seems to be another day with another promise broken by the Government. There was a specific promise by the Government to investigate a specific leak of a major report on the experience of men and women who have been let down and treated badly and shockingly by the State, from the day they were born in many cases. It is so frustrating to see that damage being done again. Why did the specific investigation transition into a generalised investigation of leaks by the Government? Who made the decision to do that? How long does it take to carry out an investigation to establish who leaked a document to a journalist? How can it take a year to do that? It smacks of a Government that is trying to dissolve the focus away from this specific group and this specific wrongdoing.
The Taoiseach is left with two minutes and 39 seconds to respond.
The Deputy suggested this is part of a long list of broken promises. I want to make it very clear that we are going to follow through on every part of the action plan that we have outlined. We are doing that. People may quibble about or disagree with aspects of that, but we have committed to the more fundamental issues that survivors have wanted action on for many years and did not get, for example, in terms of unfettered access to information and tracing. Unquestionably, the legislation we have produced has been groundbreaking in that respect. It went through pre-legislative assessment for about six months, which was good, and it has now gone through Second Stage. That is fulfilling a commitment this Government made and it is something that has been sought for over a decade. The previous Oireachtas was not in a position to deliver it.
It was longer, and it needs to be amended.
With regard to the payment scheme, the Minister did not depend on the commission's reports in respect of framing and establishing that payments scheme. In other words, he went beyond it and beyond the recommendations of the report. That legislation will come through the House and Members will come forward with their amendments and proposals. The Minister will consider those on that Stage of the Bill. The institutions burials Bill is also evidence-----
What about the leak?
I will come back to that. The Deputy said the Government is not committing.
The Taoiseach is talking down the clock.
I have not interfered in the investigation. The Government took the decision to widen it out at the very beginning because in the modern era there has been a lot of leaking and so forth. In terms of the comments I made, I was asked basic questions about whether I would be offering an apology. It was not the first time I was asked that in respect of the Government's response to the publication of the report. There are wider issues. We are not responsible for the commission and how it did its work. It did extensive and comprehensive work-----
Who made the decision to change the investigation?
That commission had been established some years ago. The commission of investigation model is the one we have. It may not have been the optimal model for this type of investigation-----
When will the investigation be completed?
We did separate ones in respect of the industrial schools and others, and perhaps lessons can be learned from that.
When will this investigation be completed?
I am not in a position to say yet, but I certainly hope we can bring it to a conclusion as quickly as possible.
It is a year later.
It is a pretty poor answer now.
