Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 25 March 2025
633. Deputy Gary Gannon asked the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth the processes in place to ensure that survivors of mother and baby homes are included in decision-making processes, particularly in light of the criticism of legislation and policies (details supplied); and if she will make a statement on the matter. [13616/25]
View answerGovernment remains committed to ongoing engagement with survivors, affected persons and their advocates in the context of the continued implementation of the Action Plan for Survivors and Former Residents of Mother and Baby and County Home Institutions.
Meaningful stakeholder engagement requires dedicated structures, processes and resources to ensure it can be inclusive, effective and sustainable. As such, under Action 1 of the Action Plan a Special Advocate for Survivors was appointed in March 2024.
The role of the Special Advocate is to promote the collective interests of survivors, as expressed by them, and to amplify their voices as a central, essential input to Government deliberations on matters which affect them. The Special Advocate's remit encompasses Mother and Baby Institutions, County Home Institutions, Magdalen Laundries, Industrial and Reformatory Schools, and related institutions, and those adopted, boarded out or the subject of an illegal birth registration.
The Special Advocate has embarked on a substantive engagement process, meeting and engaging with individual survivors and affected persons, with survivor groups, as well as with partner and support organisations in Ireland and overseas.
Separately, survivors and their advocates have individually and collectively contributed to survivor-focused consultations and stakeholder engagements around individual actions in the Action Plan, including the pre-legislative scrutiny of the Certain Institutional Burials (Authorised Interventions) Act 2022, the Birth Information and Tracing Act 2022 and Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme Act 2023. The final report of the Mother and Baby Institutions Collaborative Forum, which was published in 2022, also directly informed the measures set out in the Action Plan.
In relation to those actions which are now enshrined in legislation, a role in the decision-making process may not be possible e.g. the decision-making functions within the Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme are the responsibility of the independent Chief Deciding Officer stipulated in the legislation.
Acknowledging the criticisms to which the Deputy refers, the Department has used the learnings from previous consultations in order to improve our processes and work. For example, in relation to the National Centre for Remembrance, the Department ran a number of dedicated engagements such as an initial written consultation, followed by in-person events with the local community in the North-East Inner City, and with survivors, affected people and their families and advocates. The feedback gathered from this engagement will help to inform the ongoing work on the National Centre, and future survivor involvement and engagement in the project as it moves forward.
