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LONG-AWAITED LEGISLATION to allow for the excavation of the former mother and baby institution site in Tuam has passed through its final stage in the Oireachtas.
The Institutional Burials Bill 2022, known as the Burials Bill, will allow the children’s remains found at the site to be excavated, recovered, analysed, and finally given a formal burial.
The legislation has been sent to President Michael D Higgins for his signature, after which a process is expected to begin of establishing an office dedicated to overseeing the excavation of the site.
Other locations may also be excavated but the former Bon Secours institution in Tuam, where extensive research by local historian Catherine Corless led to the discovery of children’s remains in an unmarked mass grave, is the priority.
Minister for Children and Equality Roderic O’Gorman said that the bill “will allow us, at long last, to afford the children interred in Tuam a dignified and respectful burial”.
“My sincere hope is that this will finally bring some form of solace and closure to the families and survivors who have been so deeply affected by this abhorrent situation,” O’Gorman said.
I have met many survivors and family members and I want to thank them for their generosity in sharing their time and for their contribution to the development of this legislation.
“I would also like to thank Catherine Corless for her tireless work and commitment to the children interred in Tuam,” he said.
The legislation is being enacted five years after test excavations between November 2016 and February 2017 found a significant quantity of remains with ages ranging from 35 foetal weeks to two to three years.
The minister plans to seek Government approval to establish of Office of the Tuam Director of Authorised Interventions through an order under the legislation.
A director will then be appointed to the office “with a view to starting excavation of the site at Tuam as soon as possible”, according to a statement from the Department of Children.
An advisory board is planned for providing guidance to the director, including former residents or family members of deceased persons believed to be buried at the site.
The board is set to be chaired by a coroner and also include members with scientific expertise.
Concerns about the legislation in earlier stages raised by survivors and legal experts included the role of the coroner and the possible exclusion of certain institutions.
Changes made to the bill after pre-legislative scrutiny removed a restriction on the jurisdiction of the coroner, providing for a strengthened role for the director and the establishment of the advisory board.
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Jeeeez…. About time. Hats off to Catherine Corelss for doing all that work, persistence and campaigning and fair dues to Roderic too…. thought he did a reasonable job under the circumstances of trying to to clean up a mess not of his doing.
Why isn’t the Criminal Assets Bureau seizing their wealth? Disgraceful organisation, in my opinion, tasked with the care of these women and their unfortunate children and inflicting this misery instead.
Where is the criminal investigation?
Thanks to Catherine Corless
The Green Party to make the findings hidden for “GDPR Purposes”.
@Peter McGlynn: You’d want to brush up on how Irish law works !!!!! One thing you need to learn is that GDPR laws apply to everyone… no party, in government or not, can break that law!!!!! Okay if you’re anti Green or anti GDPR… You might like to know …. They’re not the same!!!! A SF minister would have to do the same!!!!!
@Jerriko17: this government fight the European GDPR regulator in court when it states that the implementation of the Irish national ID card is violating GDPR laws.
Yet O’Gorman of the greens cries out GDPR when it comes to hiding names of those mother and baby home perpetrators.
Minister for children mehole.
@Peter McGlynn: He can only deal with the law as it stands now, nothing to do with the Greens …. Maybe you’d like to put it on the back burner until the GDPR legislation is changed!!!!!! It’s a European based law so God knows how long that would take!! Roderic, as far as I know is a law lecturer so I’d imagine he’s a bit more familiar with it than you or me.
About fuping time
Suffer little children
@Nollaig Kelly: yeah they took the “suffering” and neglect literally
We dont need new laws to investigate possible crimes!
P.S. Endless respect and gratitude to Catherine Coreless for giving all these victims (mothers and babies) a voice too long denied. Thank you
Why does it take so long to do anything in this country
They’ll never find a cause of death that can be used as evidence against anyone in a court of law.
Why couldn’t the remains have been removed 5 years ago in the correct manner and the pieces placed in coffins once sorted
Then handed back to any familes still alive …the ones without family could be placed in an appropriate resting place or memorial
Genuinely would like to know why it took a new law
To think that the moral barometer of this country was dictated by the RC Church especially John Charles Mcquaid. These girls were victims of assault, incest & usually ignorance, they & their children were betrayed by a so called Christian institution that allegedly holds forgiveness, kindness & compassion at the core of its so called value system. Beaten, betrayed & condemned to indentured servitude their babies were sold abroad, enrolled in drug test programmes or just allowed to die from neglect. While the Church & State profited from their suffering. And even now when the cat is out of the bag we’re still gonna go though the same hip deep river of 5hit because the guilty parties will Deny, Delay, Defer and Defend at all costs until either the victims or the perpetrators are all dead.
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