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Mother and babies homes information sealed for 30 years

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Comments

  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Computer Games Moderators Posts: 51,868 CMod ✭✭✭✭Retr0gamer


    techdiver wrote: »
    In cases like that the RCC should be sued for costs also. Might make them think twice about stonewalling.

    That's a drop in the ocean for the RCC. They will stonewall even if it's totally illegal because it will cost huge amounts of time and money to get it through the courts. It's not because they want to deny the investigators the information, they would love that, it's more to waste the investigations time and try and make it as hard as possible so in the end they run out of time of it's not worth pursuing because the costs get too high. And while it's held up in court they can review said documents and more than likely 'vanish' them. It's a common tactic used by big corporations and organisations.


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Yea twas a really poorly editorial decision to segue straight to a "I cant get me chocolate digestives" segment.

    Claire can be a bit Thick.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,218 ✭✭✭✭Bannasidhe


    Retr0gamer wrote: »
    You still need legal support when you inevitably get stonewalled by the organisations looking for documents. That's where the money and time goes.

    Which it why I said legislation would be needed to ensure researchers had access to all papers held by the State and it's then agents. As the Religious Orders were being paid by the State they were acting as agents of the State.
    Plus they claim to have handed their records over.

    Corless' difficulty was to a large extent financial. She had to pay for birth and death certs. Yet, she managed to uncover a long hidden secret from records technically in the public domain. Waving those fees would speed things up.
    This sort of thing is literally what professional historians do - trawl through records, open obscure ones. Finding out where records are kept etc.
    We produce very fine historians in this country - let's use them.
    And yes, legal back up may be needed, but not to carry out the actual research.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,218 ✭✭✭✭Bannasidhe


    saabsaab wrote: »
    A Garda forensic unit investigating possible crimes could do this?

    Once the historians have done their digging the results could be handed over to a special Garda unit.
    Historians are trained to record every detail about every source and cite where each piece of information came from in a clearly annotated footnote so all the Garda unit would need to do is follow the bread crumbs and look at the sources themselves.


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Kathleen Funchion(SF) and Ivana Bacik(Lab) have published two separate pieces of legislation calling for Adopted People to be given access to their birth Certs.

    There were statements made in the Seanad today in relation to the Report.

    Theres to be a 3hr debate in the Dail tomorrow and I think it starts at 12am.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,241 ✭✭✭saabsaab


    Bannasidhe wrote: »
    Once the historians have done their digging the results could be handed over to a special Garda unit.
    Historians are trained to record every detail about every source and cite where each piece of information came from in a clearly annotated footnote so all the Garda unit would need to do is follow the bread crumbs and look at the sources themselves.


    Perhaps a special unit within the Gardai could be set up with historians those with forensic skills and legal knowledge. If legislation is needed to enable these investigation so be it.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,301 ✭✭✭John Hutton


    This is a lesson on how important and valuable birth certs are. Worth noting now that the integrity of this document is under sustained attack.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 16,013 ✭✭✭✭James Brown


    This is a lesson on how important and valuable birth certs are. Worth noting now that the integrity of this document is under sustained attack.

    Yes. Hopefully something will come from it. Hopefully the days of fudged reports and government apologies with no follow through are over.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,241 ✭✭✭saabsaab


    Bowie wrote: »
    Yes. Hopefully something will come from it. Hopefully the days of fudged reports and government apologies with no follow through are over.


    I wonder. Have come across many people born in the 40's and 50's who don't have a birth cert and weren't adopted (as far as they knew). How could you get through modern life without one?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    https://www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/arid-40209122.html

    Fergus Finlay.

    Failure to address Mother and Baby Homes scandal will haunt country for years.

    There is evidence of children being taken from their mothers, despite these mothers fighting and pleading to keep them, to facilitate the trade and export of babies.

    First of all, I hope you’ll forgive me if I say what an appalling report the Mother and Baby Homes Commission produced. I don’t know why they pulled so many punches. I don’t know why they produced a report that was so unworthy of the calibre of people involved.

    But from the very first page, it was clear that this report wasn’t going to address fundamental injustices.

    That opening few sentences has already contributed to a narrative that is designed to rob survivors of neglect and abuse — and many, including hundreds of babies, who didn’t survive — of the justice they deserve.

    A coercive abusive prison, accompanied by indeterminate (and frequently lifelong) emotional and other punishments can never be described as a refuge. And that insult is compounded by the lack of clarity (to put it kindly) throughout the report.

    There is huge evidence of false birth certs, to facilitate a trade in babies and the export of babies. There is huge evidence that nuns lied repeatedly about where hundreds of dead babies are buried.

    There is vagueness where there ought to be certainty, obfuscation where there ought to be clarity. The whole thing seems to be informed by the central conclusion, baldly stated at the start, and which I’ve quoted above.

    And the mealy-mouthed apologies from some religious orders and from the Catholic hierarchy feed further into the narrative.

    The report as published enables the narrative. And at its heart — if you can ascribe a heart to it — the narrative is an absolute and scandalous lie.

    The Catholic Church ruled us — formed our attitudes, told us what we were allowed to think. And politics was supine in front of the Church — not on its knees but on its belly.

    For the Church, control was everything.

    And that misogyny was the reason — the only reason — why shame and stigma was locked on to any woman or child who became pregnant without being married.

    Sure, some families might have been callous. But in the main, families didn’t turn their backs on their daughters because they wanted to. The valley of the squinting windows, created by a misogynistic Church, forced them to treat their children, and their children’s babies, as outcasts.

    The injustice and cruelty with which women and babies were treated — and it was manifest — may not have been enshrined in statute, but it was the unwritten, and sacrosanct, law of the land. A land where politics did a misogynistic Church’s bidding.

    I’ve read the government statement, and the “Action Plan” that’s proposed. Behind the gobbledegook, it’s a miserable attempt.

    On that basis there might, just might, be a possibility that proper legislation will see the light of day in 2023. Really? A determined minister could do a lot better than that.

    n fact, it’s going to be whoever an “interdepartmental group” decides they should be, and they will get whatever that “interdepartmental group” decides they should get.

    An interdepartmental group, by definition, is a group of civil servants, who will come together with one primary objective — to protect the interests of their own departments — and not to advance any objective you might have.

    You can search for a year and you won’t find a group of civil servants burning with a passion to right the wrongs of the past. Sadly, such civil servants, despite their undoubted merits, don’t exist.

    If you make this your personal project, there is a slight chance of justice being delivered. If you don’t, the litany of failure will haunt us all forever.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    Watching a replay of the Seanad today. O'Gorman should be under no illusions that the commission got it very wrong and the report has been rejected.
    There is disbelief at some of it's findings. The Dail should be interesting tomorrow.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Watching a replay of the Seanad today. O'Gorman should be under no illusions that the commission got it very wrong and the report has been rejected.
    There is disbelief at some of it's findings. The Dail should be interesting tomorrow.

    I think coverage of the M+B debate starts at 12am from the Dail.

    Atm Student Nurse pay is being debated.

    Oireachtas TV is available throughout Ireland on:

    Saorview Channel 22
    Virgin Media Channel 207
    Sky Channel 517
    eir Vision Channel 504
    Vodafone Channels 201, 207 (Dáil Éireann) and 208 (Seanad Éireann)


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    I think coverage of the M+B debate starts at 12am from the Dail.

    Atm Student Nurse pay is being debated.

    Oireachtas TV is available throughout Ireland on:

    Saorview Channel 22
    Virgin Media Channel 207
    Sky Channel 517
    eir Vision Channel 504
    Vodafone Channels 201, 207 (Dáil Éireann) and 208 (Seanad Éireann)

    It's leaders questions atm and this is also on Rte 1 now. I think only the Leaders Questions part will be on Rte 1.

    Maybe the M+B homes debate will be lumped in with Leaders Questions, I don't know.

    I would imagine that the debate over Special Needs Schools will also take a lot of time today.

    Edit:
    A link to the schedule below but there is no timetable. Scroll down to open the PDF.
    https://www.oireachtas.ie/en/oireachtas-tv/oireachtas-tv-channel/


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Leaders questions is now finished.

    Order of Business for the day is being discussed.


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Roderic O Gorman on now on Oireachtas TV Rte 22.

    Nice of them to time it with the US Inaugaration.

    He has mentioned Alice Lister who reported on these homes from early 1900s - 1950


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    ROG said(I'll add details on this later):

    Archive available end of Feb. Not sure what access is permitted.

    GDPR heads of bill available end march- early April. This looks like a long drawn out process if Tuam bill is anything to go by.

    Redress inter departmental proposals end of April.
    Fergus Findlay argued against this

    Supports to include:
    Enhanced medical card if 6 months spent in homes.
    Counselling

    Tuam legislation soon?

    Memorial location to be discussed with relevant groups and records to be made available at site?

    Incorporating story into NUIG curriculum

    Scholarship named after Alice Lister


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Deleted


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    Funchions speech is powerful. As a survivor said "what is the point of this report?". It discredited the survivors testimony.

    So many survivors came forward but many others were not able for psychological or other reasons. They must all be disgusted after waiting 5 years. They were forced to relive the horrors for nothing.

    Are Leo or Michael here or are they happy to let O'Gorman take the heat?

    A few TDs have called for a criminal investigation.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Funchions speech is powerful. As a survivor said "what is the point of this report?". It discredited the survivors testimony.

    So many survivors came forward but many others were not able for psychological or other reasons. They must all be disgusted after waiting 5 years. They were forced to relive the horrors for nothing.

    Are Leo or Michael here or are they happy to let O'Gorman take the heat?

    Yes. Straight to the point.

    Micheal and Leo were but might have left. It's hard to tell who's there to be honest


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    Fergus O'Dowd (FG) really going for it.
    The Greens are taking the rap here while the 2 parties with the legacy involvement (FF + FG) are hiding.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    Very good speeches in the Dail today. Some better than others. There are a lot of TDs that want action and there seems to be a lot of anger in the constituencies. Naughton was very knowledgeable on the vaccine trials. He described the babies as 'pin cushions' on account of the injections they got.
    O'Gorman knows they are watching him now. All we can do is keep the pressure up by emailing TDs with our thoughts.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Very good speeches in the Dail today. Some better than others. There are a lot of TDs that want action and there seems to be a lot of anger in the constituencies. Naughton was very knowledgeable on the vaccine trials. He described the babies as 'pin cushions' on account of the injections they got.
    O'Gorman knows they are watching him now. All we can do is keep the pressure up by emailing TDs with our thoughts.

    Catherine Connolly has put up her speech yesterday
    https://twitter.com/catherinegalway/status/1352220893473345536?s=19


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,241 ✭✭✭saabsaab


    Catherine Connolly has put up her speech yesterday
    https://twitter.com/catherinegalway/status/1352220893473345536?s=19


    Strong speech. Will it have any effect on the situation? That's a question not a statement.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,612 ✭✭✭Yellow_Fern


    It is shocking how uncritical some of the media coverage is. For example, the allegation that the mother and baby homes were racist. Repeated in the press without any balance. Look at the RTÉ story on the issue. One person making these allegations says

    "couldn't understand" how the Commission of Investigation reached such a conclusion.

    "Even in the first statement it seems like a contradiction in terms; on the one hand to say there was no evidence of discrimination and then to continue on and say race was taken into account in placing children - that's a very confused inconclusive statement,
    " he said.

    "I was in Pelletstown during the 1960s and the report says virtually 100% of illegitimate children were adopted. Of the majority of the mixed-race children in Pelletstown, only 48% were adopted. Now if that isn't racism, can somebody explain to me what is racism?"
    https://www.rte.ie/news/mother-and-baby-homes/2021/0119/1190616-mother-and-baby-homes-ireland/

    What he didn’t mention is that i) the adoption rate was actually 54%, ii) white kids were not adopted at a 100% rate, actually the report says 43% over the long history of the home, iii) we don’t know that the remaining mixed race kids children were not adopted, iv) some of the 'mixed' race had white fathers according to the report, v) there is much evidence in the reports that such babies were not treated worse. How can such a clueless person making such strong allegations not receive any pushback at all?


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    saabsaab wrote: »
    Strong speech. Will it have any effect on the situation? That's a question not a statement.

    ROG seems determined to give control of the Redress to an Inter Departmental Group which means he is ignoring critics of the Report .

    He is either incompetent and tone deaf or has no respect for the Survivors or Critics of the report and only concerned with defending the Gov position of delay and cover up.

    It will be interesting to see if momentum can be built by Politicians in the Dail to persuade him to change his mind.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    ROG seems determined to give control of the Redress to an Inter Departmental Group which means he is ignoring critics of the Report .

    He is either incompetent and tone deaf or has no respect for the Survivors or Critics of the report and only concerned with defending the Gov position of delay and cover up.

    It will be interesting to see if momentum can be built by Politicians in the Dail to persuade him to change his mind.

    He is being told what to do and it will cost his party in the long run. I did send him Finlay's article and reservations about the Inter Departmental Group via email.
    An interdepartmental group, by definition, is a group of civil servants, who will come together with one primary objective — to protect the interests of their own departments — and not to advance any objective you might have.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    He is bring told what to do and it will cost his party in the long run. I did send him Finlay's article and reservations about the Inter Departmental Group via email.

    Well Done.

    I think he said the date for the Group to be formed is April so there is time to get this changed.

    Adoption Rights Alliance has launched an email address for people to make complaints on the report also.
    https://twitter.com/adoptionrights/status/1352039814179250180?s=19

    https://twitter.com/susanlohan/status/1352034873385639938?s=19


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    This is Roderic O Gormans full statement yesterday.

    https://www.gov.ie/en/speech/2504b-statement-of-roderic-ogorman-td-report-of-commission-of-investigation-into-mother-and-baby-homes-and-certain-related-matters-dail-eireann-20-january/

    Introduction
    Last week, the Report of the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes was published and following this, the Taoiseach, on behalf of the Government, offered our apology and asked for forgiveness for the failings of the Irish State, failings that repeated over decades, and which had the most horrendous consequences for our most vulnerable citizens.

    The Report is an enormous piece of work, and it will take time for all that it discloses about what happened in these institutions to be fully understood. Today, Deputies have the opportunity to reflect on the many failings on the part of both the State and individual religious congregations, and most importantly, the devastating impact that these failings had on mothers and children.

    In my own contribution, I want to outline in more detail elements of the Governments Action Plan in response to the Report and update the House on progress on key issues like the right of access to personal information and restorative recognition.

    In the discussion of the Commission’s Report over the last week, it is clear that survivors have been left disappointed by aspects of the Report, particularly the tone and language used within the Executive Summary. They have cited sections where a strictly legalistic approach is taken to describing the profoundly personal impacts of what happened within the institutions. Sections where the Commission’s conclusion that it could not find evidence of what happened, and where this could be interpreted as a denial of the experiences of survivors.

    I understand that disappointment.

    As I stated in the Seanad yesterday, when I read the Report, the aspect that had the greatest impact on me was the Chapter on the Confidential Committee. It is the clearest possible account of the suffering of mothers and children. It tells the lived experience of those who spent time in these institutions.

    It makes it clear that these women were compelled by circumstances over which they had no control and no choice, to put their children up for adoption.

    The words of the Confidential Committee represents the truth of what happened in this institutions over so many years.

    Failure by the State
    When the Taoiseach made his apology last week, he made it on behalf of the State. Having had the opportunity to read through the Report in its entirety, it illustrates gross dereliction of duty by the Irish State across decades. The State’s failings are unambiguously demonstrated, and this is particularly so because the Report contains that serious concerns were brought to those in power, time and time again, but without action ensuing.

    Our own officials were flagging the conditions within these institutions, the high infant mortality and the poor health of children. There wasn’t complete silence. Repeatedly, warnings were raised, but they were ignored.

    As I referenced in the Dáil last week, Alice Litster was an Inspector for the Department of Local Government for thirty years, from 1927 through to 1957. From reading the chapters on the individual institutions, it is clear that Miss Litster tried valiantly to improve the conditions within these institutions. She raised concerns about the number of young children within them, highlighting the number of school age children who were being denied an education, and demanded that local authorities provide suitable care and foster homes for these children.

    Miss Litster cautioned about the level of adoptions to the USA. In an undated memo on adoptions from Sean Ross, she noted that:

    "The babies so sent are the best of our children in the Home, the prettiest, the healthiest, the most promising. The restrictions on sending children out of the country, to be incorporated it is hoped in an Adopted Children’s Bill, will doubtless put a stop to this export of children."

    In 1947 Miss Litster commented that many Tuam mothers received no ante-natal care. She criticised the county manager for issuing an order that prohibited the admission of expectant mothers, chargeable to Co Galway, prior to the seventh month of pregnancy. She suggested that this would place a good deal of hardship upon women

    "whose condition must become a matter of common knowledge before they are admitted and whose efforts to conceal their condition must have a bad effect upon the health of their infants”.

    Miss Litster issued constant warnings of overcrowding and how this was a feature of all ‘special institutions’, highlighting the severity of the situation at hand and the detrimental effects this was having on women and children.

    In 1943, Miss Litster provides a detailed report of the children’s nursery in Bessborough. In this, she describes,

    "The greater numbers of the babies were ‘miserable scraps of humanity, wizened, some emaciated and almost all had rash and sores all over their bodies, faces, hands and heads’. Their cots ‘were clean, and bed-clothing clean and good."

    Miss Litster was determined, and although few improvements were happening, she persevered. It is from her reports that we have undeniable evidence of the failure of the State to intervene, even after the horrors of these institutions were made known. Her efforts on behalf of the vulnerable mothers and children in these institutions should be remembered.

    The failings of the State is not just represented by Government Departments ignoring the evidence of what was happening. The Report shows that Local Authorities were intrinsic to the running of these institutions, in terms of paying for many of the mothers that entered them. County Homes were a direct arm of the local authority. We know that meetings of Galway County Council actually took place in the buildings of the institution in Tuam. Many of us here have served in local government, and would be conscious of the real the real commitment of those bodies to improving their local area.

    I understand that a number of local authorities are currently considering making apologies for their involvement and maintenance of the system of treatment of women and children demonstrated in this report and I think such steps are necessary and important.

    Government Response
    The scale of these failures by the State require a response that is comprehensive and meaningful. It must represent a transformation – only in the State’s engagement with survivors, but also in its supports for them. The relationship of trust between the State and the former residents of these institutions has been broken – the Government must begin the process of rebuilding that relationship.

    The Cabinet has adopted a whole of Government response to the Commission Report. This contains 22 actions based on 8 themes many of which directly address the concerns and needs of survivors today.

    Access to Personal Information
    All of us have received representations regarding the importance that many former residents place on access to personal information. Progressing Information and Tracing legislation is an absolute priority for myself, for the Taoiseach and for the entire Government. I have been engaging extensively with the Attorney General on this issue, approaching the matter in a manner grounded in GDPR, where the right of an individual to access personal information about themselves is central. My Department and the Attorney General’s Office are working with a view to have Heads of Bill of Information and Tracing legislation by end March/ early April. This can then proceed rapidly to pre-legislative scrutiny.

    Information and tracing legislation will allow for access to wider early life information. It would also allow the National Contact Preference Register to be put on a statutory basis.

    However, I want to emphasise to Deputies that our work on this legislation will not delay other efforts to provide earlier access to personal information.

    My Department is working intensively to prepare for receipt of the Commission archive at the end of February. I wish to ensure that people can access personal information contained within the archive in line with GDPR. We have established a dedicated Information Management Unit headed by an official with data protection and legal expertise who will be supported by an archivist in advancing many of the important record-related recommendations put forward by the Commission. I have also engaged with the Data Protection Commissioner and have met with independent international experts in the area of GDPR – as was suggested to me by members of this house. This intensive work will continue, with a view to having robust policies and procedures in place for managing subject access requests. Following further consultation with DPC, I hope to publish our policies and procedures prior to 28 February.

    My Department will also continue to work to ensure that GDPR compliant policies are appropriately applied to all access points for personal information.

    Other Responses
    Beyond the issue of access to personal information, another core commitment in the Government’s Response is the creation of a Restorative Recognition Scheme to provide financial recognition. My Department will lead an inter-departmental group which will develop such a scheme and bring forward proposals for it by the end of April. I have already written to releant Government departments, seeking nominations for membership of this group. While the group will consider the three categories of former residents that the Commission highlighted, the Government took the significant decision that its considerations are not restricted to just those three groups.

    This inter-departmental group will also assess the provision of a form of enhanced medical card for everyone who spent more than 6 months in Mother and Baby institutions.

    Further health supports include access to counselling through the National Counselling Service, within which former residents of Mother & Baby and County Homes are now considered a prioritised group, , meaning they will not be put on a general waiting list. The National Counselling Service has specific professional expertise with past trauma and childhood trauma, and can offer crisis counselling, or counselling services on a short, medium, or long-term basis.

    Legislation to allow for the dignified exhumation of the site in Tuam and in other sites if required, and providing for DNA identification will be brought for pre-legislative scrutiny soon. I have written to the Joint Oireachtas Committee asking for it to be prioritised on their agenda.

    It is important that proper memorialisation of Ireland’s history of institutionalisation and institutional abuse takes place, particularly important that the testimonies of women are heard, among both our generation and the generations that will come after us.

    We have committed to establishing a national memorial and records centre related to institutional trauma, and will be engaging with survivors, as well as professional archivists and historians, to determine how best memorialisation should be happen. This includes both the location of the centre, as well as how best records should be handled, taking into account the sensitivities of people’s personal information. We will also ensure that Departments and State bodies will prioritise the transfer of original files to the National Archives so that they can be publically accessible.

    The overarching theme is that this action list will be progressed in a survivor-centred manner. An enhanced model of engagement with former residents, their representative groups, as well as the survivor diaspora will be established, following consultation with the Collaborative Forum. This week I have written to the Collaborative Forum, seeking two meetings with them next month.

    Other commitments include:

    incorporation of elements of the Report into the second-level curriculum; more specifically how the Commission’s short video on the experiences of women and children can be incorporated
    research on Terminology, Representation and Mis-representation with NUIG; and ensuring that this research informs our commitments on memorialisation and national archives
    local and national memorialisation and commemoration events;
    creation of a specific fund which supports children who experience disadvantage in memory of the children who died in the institutions;
    and the creation of a number of scholarships researching childhood disadvantage
    In relation to this last point, I’ve asked the Minister for Further and Higher Education if he would consider naming a scholarship after Alice Litster, to mark her efforts to shine a light on what was happening in this institutions over many years.

    Conclusion
    As I said at the outset, trust between the State and former residents has been broken, because of the State’s failures. It is up to the Government, acting on behalf of the State, to start to rebuild this trust. This means acting comprehensively and acting rapidly, aware of the age of many of former residents and their need to see the tangible benefits of the actions that have been committed to. As a Government, we are aware that the apology delivered by the Taoiseach will ring hollow if it is not back up by actions.

    I have outlined timelines for progressing some of the actions above and we will outline further details in forthcoming weeks.

    As Deputies know, there will also be engagement with the religious congregations and charities that were directly responsible for running these institutions. I have sought meetings with a number of bodies specifically on the issues of apology, their own contributions to restorative recognition and the provision of institutional records which would be beneficial to survivors.

    The State has recognised and seeks to atone for its failures in a meaningful way. I think we all share the belief that others need to do the same.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,612 ✭✭✭Yellow_Fern


    Funchions speech is powerful. As a survivor said "what is the point of this report?". It discredited the survivors testimony.

    So many survivors came forward but many others were not able for psychological or other reasons. They must all be disgusted after waiting 5 years. They were forced to relive the horrors for nothing.

    Are Leo or Michael here or are they happy to let O'Gorman take the heat?

    A few TDs have called for a criminal investigation.
    A handful have come forward. Says who? Show me the evidence?
    A few TDs have called for a criminal investigation.
    Investigation of what breaking what law?


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,241 ✭✭✭saabsaab


    A handful have come forward. Says who? Show me the evidence?

    Investigation of what breaking what law?


    Well let's start..


    Criminal neglect
    child traffic
    sexual abuse

    Falsification of official documentation
    illegal detention of a person against their will
    possible murder...


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    A handful have come forward. Says who? Show me the evidence?

    Investigation of what breaking what law?

    Calm yourself.

    Approx 500 gave testimony to the commission. 56,000 mothers and 57,000 children went through the mother and baby homes. Many survivors did not give testimony.

    You'd have to ask the TDs but I believe they wanted criminal investigations around the 9000 missing dead babies for a start. I guess lethal neglect, illegal adoptions and vaccine trials could also be investigated.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    https://www.thejournal.ie/mother-and-baby-homes-burials-5305049-Jan2021/
    The report noted that the congregation “provided the Commission with an affidavit about burials generally and specifically about the Castlepollard and Sean Ross child burials but very little evidence was provided to support the statements in it”.

    “The affidavit was, in many respects, speculative, inaccurate and misleading,” the report added.


    It also noted that a small burial ground in the grounds of Bessborough was opened in 1956 for members of the congregation.

    “It seems to have been assumed by former residents and advocacy groups that this is also where the children who died in Bessborough are buried as there are occasional meetings and commemoration ceremonies held there.”

    However, the report stated that the “vast majority of children who died in Bessborough are not buried there; it seems that only one child is buried there”.

    In the report, the commission said it finds it difficult to understand how or why certain records do not appear to exist.


    “The Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary do not know where the children who died in Bessborough are buried. The Commission finds this very difficult to comprehend as Bessborough was a mother and baby home for the duration of the period covered by the Commission (1922 – 1998) and the congregation was involved with it for all of this time.

    “The Commission finds it very difficult to understand that no member of the congregation was able to say where the children who died in Bessborough are buried.”

    Maybe they would be more forthcoming on the witness stand.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,301 ✭✭✭John Hutton


    Just a point on the 9000 figure. This is a total figure, not the amount "above" the normal mortality rate. If people are going to be suggesting criminal procedures they need to be coherent, accurate and precise, which means they will need to do the sums on those figures if they are to be taken seriously and not have any campaign for prosecution immediately collapse.

    Regarding survivor testimony, we have seen in the past how this can be inaccurate. For example, in a previous inquiry a very significant amount of women (a third of those who testified) stated that they underwent symphysiotomy when this was not the case. I do not think that people deliberately lie in situations but the memory is a funny thing, especially when it is about something that occurred decades ago. This example underlines how survivor testimony is not proof, that other evidence is needed which is the entire point of commissions of investigation. I make this point again in the context of people talking about criminal prosecutions where testimony and evidence has to stand up to scrutiny. It is also important to remind people that the testimony was mixed, not everyone said there was abuse.

    Personally, I think there is zero chance of criminal prosecutions (I note that this appears solely directed towards religious, letting the state, fathers etc. off the hook again). Partially because of what I mention above, but also because the worst of this occurred over 50 years ago. This is unfortunate as there is individual responsibility at play here, and not just corporate.

    The news cycle has moved on this week, and overall I don't think this has changed much, people already knew that these places could be terrible and women were treated badly. I think people are pretty numbed to it, there was nothing in this report that was a surprise, except for when it pointed out that evidence, in a small number of areas, did not support the common narrative in that some things either did not happen, or were not as bad/widespread as people thought. This thread is reflective of that, where only a handful of posters are continuing to comment and breaches of forum rules are unnoticed (the copy pasting of news articles in their entirety, some from behind paywalls) There will be some sort of redress scheme, which the religious orders will voluntarily support. I think the nature of the scheme will depend on whether the mid 1970s cut off applies, because the homes that existed until the 1990s, and the handful of charitable bodies that remain (such as the one run by the Legion of Mary) are altogether different than those that existed in the 1940s, both in terms of how they are ran, but more importantly, their role with and supervision by the state.

    As for the future, obviously records need to be made available, baptism, birth certs etc. (important to note that it is the government who are holding this up) and the location of burials will need to be established and, where appropriate (obviously if people are appropriately buried they should not be disturbed) excavated. It will be interesting to see what the reaction is when the myth about 800 babies being buried in a septic tank is revealed as that. This will lead to further questions about where the bodies are, and again give rise to speculation that there are no graves because the death certs were faked, with the babies instead being adopted/sold and calls for a further inquiry with regard to adoptions.

    I think there will be little appetite for further inquiries, either among the general public and certainly "official Ireland", personally. It will be up to those who spent time in these institutions, good or bad, to document their experiences. Future historians can sift through it, and future generations will have the final say.

    The whole thing is just sad, I say none of the above with any 'satisfaction'. Hopefully people in 70 years won't be wondering how we, in 2021, let other horrible things happen in our society and they are having commissions about that.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,612 ✭✭✭Yellow_Fern


    saabsaab wrote: »
    Well let's start..


    Criminal neglect
    child traffic
    sexual abuse

    Falsification of official documentation
    illegal detention of a person against their will
    possible murder...

    Child neglect happens all the time. How many times does it end up in the courts? Normally in extreme cases a child is taken into care. When it goes to the courts it tends to involve severe beatings of small childern. Can you name a single court case of where it was done years later? How the hell can you prove beyond doubt that such a beating occured when the event was 70 years ago? Was it even a crime back then?
    There is no evidence of illegal detention. There is no evidence that the sisters sexuaally abused or allowed it to occur. There is no evidence of child trafficing. The idea that there was widesread fallsification of documents referred to what is known as the 2012 HSE memo. It allegd this happened at Bessborough but the report found its based on a misintepreation.
    Calm yourself.

    Approx 500 gave testimony to the commission. 56,000 mothers and 57,000 children went through the mother and baby homes. Many survivors did not give testimony.

    You'd have to ask the TDs but I believe they wanted criminal investigations around the 9000 missing dead babies for a start. I guess lethal neglect, illegal adoptions and vaccine trials could also be investigated.

    I am sure there are many testimonies that we havent heard. But there is no evidence of widespread anger at the findings. Just a few loud lobby groups.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    I am sure there are many testimonies that we havent heard. But there is no evidence of widespread anger at the findings. Just a few loud lobby groups.

    Ah stop. You must have had your head in the sand since the report was published.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/state-abandoned-in-1947-proposed-investigation-into-almost-700-bessborough-deaths-1.4463373
    State abandoned in 1947 proposed investigation into almost 700 Bessborough deaths
    Decision came after the Co Cork mother and baby home was temporarily closed.

    The State in 1947 abandoned a threatened special investigation into the deaths of nearly 700 children at the Bessborough mother and baby home, but warned that it could resume if the institution’s infant-mortality rate did not fall.

    The decision to halt the investigation came after the State’s chief medical adviser, Dr James Deeny, had temporarily closed the Cork home and sacked the Sacred Heart nun then in charge.

    Between 1922 and its temporary closure in December 1946, 674 children died there, including 102 between April 1943 and March 1944 – where it then had an 82 per cent infant-mortality rate. Ireland’s national infant-mortality rate was about 7 per cent for the same period.

    I hadn't heard that before. I think more information will start to come out now.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/diarmaid-ferriter-mcquaid-s-shadow-hangs-over-mother-and-baby-homes-1.4464400

    McQuaid’s shadow hangs over mother and baby homes.

    His defiant assertions about Irish Catholicism stand as monuments to a damaging delusion.
    McQuaid passionately believed the Catholic Church was “the one true church” and that belief dictated so many of his words and actions. Given the range of his interventions and his ability to generate obedience from so many, including politicians, as revealed in the mother and baby home report in relation to adoption legislation, it is hardly surprising that the phrase “McQuaid’s Ireland” achieved much currency in the attempt to summarise his domination.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,301 ✭✭✭John Hutton


    https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/diarmaid-ferriter-mcquaid-s-shadow-hangs-over-mother-and-baby-homes-1.4464400

    McQuaid’s shadow hangs over mother and baby homes.

    His defiant assertions about Irish Catholicism stand as monuments to a damaging delusion.
    Interesting article.

    Unfashionable as it is to point out now, McQuaid was not devoid of charity; indeed, he dispensed a lot of it. Historian Deirdre McMahon has warned of the inadequacy of “crude caricatures of hidebound Catholic reaction with which McQuaid has become identified since his death in 1973”.
    He was a significant and often enlightened educationalist in the 1930s and as archbishop co-ordinated many welfare activities in his diocese in relation to clothing, fuel and housing. One of the reasons Éamon de Valera lobbied for his appointment was because he was impressed with McQuaid’s social concerns.

    McQuaid devoted much time to services for those with alcoholism, mental and physical disabilities and the building of hospitals. The problem, however, as with the wider church in Ireland, was that McQuaid wanted all on his terms and had too much power which was abused, meaning “McQuaid’s Ireland” long outlived the man himself, who died in 1973.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    https://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/ronan-mullen-calls-for-national-voluntary-collection-for-mother-and-baby-home-survivors-1.4465131
    Independent Senator Ronan Mullen has called for a national voluntary collection to allow individuals and families contribute to a redress package for survivors of mother and baby homes because there was a community element to the issue.

    Such a considerate man.

    I wonder has he ever thought to ask the religious orders where all the missing babies are buried.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,241 ✭✭✭saabsaab


    Church bodies will not give any information as to where the bodies of the over 900 children that died at Bessborough might be found. It can find no evidence that there were significant sums of money involved in sending babies to the US to be adopted, but then, it is the opinion of the commission that access to the administrative records of the congregations that arranged such adoptions be governed by the religious themselves.


    Beyond belief. This is now not 50 years ago!


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 33,318 ✭✭✭✭gmisk


    https://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/ronan-mullen-calls-for-national-voluntary-collection-for-mother-and-baby-home-survivors-1.4465131



    Such a considerate man.

    I wonder has he every thought to ask the religious orders where all the missing babies are buried.
    I knew it would be him before reading the story tbh zzz.
    He just happens to serve on the board of one of the Daughters of Charity’s corporate charities....


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,778 ✭✭✭up for anything


    https://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/ronan-mullen-calls-for-national-voluntary-collection-for-mother-and-baby-home-survivors-1.4465131



    Such a considerate man.

    I wonder has he every thought to ask the religious orders where all the missing babies are buried.



    He only worries about the unborn...once they're dead or born then he doesn't give a toss. Abhorrent little person that he is.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 16,527 ✭✭✭✭whisky_galore


    https://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/ronan-mullen-calls-for-national-voluntary-collection-for-mother-and-baby-home-survivors-1.4465131



    Such a considerate man.

    I wonder has he ever thought to ask the religious orders where all the missing babies are buried.

    How would that work?
    Would anyone who was not of age before the last laundry closed be exempt? :D


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Micheal Martin was on Brendan O Connor this morning.

    Didn't catch it all, from what I did he mostly spoke about the Schools and Covid but did speake on the M+B homes for the last few mins.

    Brendan mentioned that people were insulted by not getting a copy of the report before the Webinar.

    He didn't take any responsibility for it.

    I'll post the clip later.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,241 ✭✭✭saabsaab


    To be fair the responsibility would rest with the Minister.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    saabsaab wrote: »
    To be fair the responsibility would rest with the Minister.

    Yes but they were both on the webinar and they both spoke at length. O'Gorman is a puppet for FFG in this instance. They knew the spin they wanted but it utterly failed and in many ways got more attention for the survivors and the injustices/wrongdoings/evil/atrocities.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,758 ✭✭✭stockshares


    Micheal Martin was on Brendan O Connor this morning.

    Didn't catch it all, from what I did he mostly spoke about the Schools and Covid but did speake on the M+B homes for the last few mins.

    Brendan mentioned that people were insulted by not getting a copy of the report before the Webinar.

    He didn't take any responsibility for it.

    I'll post the clip later.

    Interview starts at the beginning of the show.
    M+B home segment starts at 44m:22s.
    https://www.rte.ie/radio/radioplayer/html5/#/radio1/11274045


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/courtandcrime/arid-40212506.html
    A former resident of a Cork mother and baby home has initiated a High Court damages action against the State, the HSE and the order of Catholic nuns who ran that facility.

    The action has been brought by Caroline Donovan who was a resident of Bessborough House in Cork on two occasions, once in the mid 1980s and also for a period during the early 1990s.

    She says that while a resident of Bessborough, which was located in Blackrock, Cork, she was subjected to physical and emotional abuse which, it is claimed, amounted to a breach of her constitutional rights.

    The action is understood to be one of the first brought following the publication earlier this month of the final report by the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes.

    Interesting development. One to watch.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,613 ✭✭✭Cluedo Monopoly


    https://www.independent.ie/regionals/sligochampion/news/the-voiceless-abuse-of-women-and-their-children-laid-bare-in-commission-report-on-irelands-mother-and-baby-homes-39982289.html
    Many pregnant women fled to Britain, to protect this secrecy, only to face the prospect of being returned to Ireland against their wishes.

    British Catholic charities put considerable pressure on the Irish Hierarchy and on the government to repatriate the women.

    Some of the treatment meted out to these women, who were commonly described as PFIs, (pregnant from Ireland) was inhumane and occasionally it placed them at medical risk.

    British authorities also returned children born there to Irish women, sometimes approaching the woman's family who might be unaware of the child's existence, asking them to take the child. The Department of Health and local authorities appear to have co-operated with these practices.

    The main motivation behind the British and Irish Catholic charities who were involved in repatriating Irish women from Britain, either pregnant or with their new-born infant, was to prevent these children being 'lost' to Catholicism through adoption into Protestant families.

    The report states that several women were repatriated at a very late stage in pregnancy and in circumstances that presented a serious risk to health.

    What are they doing in the Hyacinth House?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,612 ✭✭✭Yellow_Fern


    saabsaab wrote: »
    Church bodies will not give any information as to where the bodies of the over 900 children that died at Bessborough might be found. It can find no evidence that there were significant sums of money involved in sending babies to the US to be adopted, but then, it is the opinion of the commission that access to the administrative records of the congregations that arranged such adoptions be governed by the religious themselves.


    Beyond belief. This is now not 50 years ago!

    As someone who dug up human remains and have been involved with medical record storage it is very plausible that it is forgotten.They probably have an idea where they are but are not sure. The bones of 900 infants is far smaller than you might imagine. also they dont always last long before dissappearing in acid brown earth soils that occur around in Cork. Not sure if the soil at the site acid brown earth but it might be.


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