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THE FINAL REPORT in the ‘Grace’ case inquiry is to be published today after a six-year delay.
Minister for Children, Disability and Equality Norma Foley is bringing a memo to Cabinet today to get approval for the publication of the final report of the Farrelly Commission’s investigation.
The case concerns a young woman with profound intellectual disabilities who was left in a foster home in the Waterford area for almost 20 years, despite a succession of sexual and physical abuse allegations.
The Farrelly Commission of Inquiry was first established in 2017 by then-Taoiseach Enda Kenny to investigate the disability service in the South East, and the care and protection of ‘Grace’ and 47 other people who were also cared for in the former foster home.
The report was due to be published in May 2019, but has been given numerous extensions over the last number of years.
Last year, former Children’s Minister Roderic O’Gorman and former Minister of State for Disabilities Anne Rabbitte met with the commission to voice their concerns over the delays.
The long-awaited final report was delivered to O’Gorman last July, but the publication date was pushed out again until 12 April – last week – which was missed.
In an interview with The Journal last week, Norma Foley committed to publishing the report as soon as possible.
In 1995, on the back of claims that Grace suffered abuse in her foster home, the South Eastern Health Board decided not to place any more people in the home.
However, a decision to remove Grace was overturned in 1996.
As a result, she stayed in the home until a whistleblower’s complaint in 2009.
One of two interim reports into the case – running to a total of about 800 pages - said the “evidence on the rationale for the decision was weak and confused”.
The controversy resulted in the then-HSE Director General Tony O’Brien apologising to the 47 families – including Grace’s – who were in the care of the home.
Speaking in the Dáil in 2021, Fianna Fáil TD John McGuinness said those who knew what was happening to ‘Grace’ should be “chased down” and held accountable.
McGuinness, who is now the Leas Ceann Comhairle of the Dáil, has in the past also questioned why the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) had not provided an explanation as to why it decided not to press charges against officials or agencies responsible for the care of Grace.
A Garda investigation was launched after a whistleblower made a formal complaint about the care of Grace.
The Sunday Independent and The Sunday Times reported in 2022 that gardaí recommended prosecutions for endangerment and negligence in a file sent to the DPP.
However, the DPP decided against prosecution, with no one facing criminal charges.
Prior to the establishment of the inquiry in 2017, a report into the Grace scandal by senior counsel Conor Dignam was published in 2016.
Review of Certain Matters Relating to a Disability Service in the South East details the measures taken by members of the foster care home and the following actions by the HSE.
In his assessment of the HSE’s reactions to the sexual abuse allegations, Dignam concluded that the HSE had failed to investigate properly, and that there were still aspects that had not been examined fully:
“These are all allegations of the most serious nature and it seems to me that they should have been required to have been inquired into fully and expeditiously in the interests of Grace, all of those other service users, the relationship between the HSE and the service provider and the persons against whom allegations were implicitly or expressly made.”
The final report will be made public later this afternoon.
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