Survivors of abuse, along with legal experts and academics have lined up in opposition to controversial legislation to seal millions of child abuse records for 75 years.

The legislation had been due in Committee State in the coming weeks but this has now been deferred to allow the Oireachtas education committee to further scrutinise.

An advisory council to the National Archives told the Government as far back as 2013 that it was possible to seal child abuse records for longer than 30 years.

A majority of abuse survivors have expressed concern over government plans to seal millions of child abuse records for 75 years.

An Irish naval service ship on Mediterranean rescue several years ago was unable to recover a dead migrant from the water for four hours because EU states refused to accept the body, a former mission member has said.

Legislation to seal millions of child abuse records for 75 years was drafted so “all possible provisions” of the National Archives Act, which allows the public or State bodies to access records, would be disapplied.

Just over a week ago, it emerged that the Cabinet did something very “dangerous”.

The State’s proposal to seal the records of the Laffoy/Ryan commission of inquiry and its associated bodies for 75 years is unjustified and wrong, writes

The Eighth Amendment was never about Catholicism. The Catholic Church did not insert it, the political system did, writes Victoria White.

MENTAL Health Services Minister Kathleen Lynch is to visit “in the coming weeks” a psychiatric unit earmarked for closure by the HSE, amid mounting opposition from doctors.

An investigation team was established today to examine the circumstances surrounding the death of an elderly woman at a mental health facility in north Cork.