Organ scandal families urged to quit Dunne inquiry
Parents for Justice (PFJ), which will hold an extraordinary general meeting in Dublin later today, said they will settle for nothing less than a full statutory inquiry.
The group represents over 2,000 families of deceased relatives whose organs were removed and retained by hospitals without the parents’ knowledge or consent.
The families withdrew their co-operation from the Dunne Inquiry last month because of delays in reaching the promised statutory phase of the investigation.
Today PfJ will provide members with the template of a letter they can use to demand the return of all material they submitted to the inquiry.
The documentation includes submissions, transcripts of hearings and photocopies of any documents given to any third party.
The letter also stipulates the families are withdrawing all consent for the use of any information, whether electronically stored or in hard copy, to be used in any report presented to a third party.
“We believe that without the co-operation of the families, for whose benefit we always believed the inquiry was established, the Dunne Inquiry is finished,” said PFJ spokesperson Fionnula O’Reilly.
It is understood the inquiry has received 400 submissions from families, a number of which continued to co-operate with the investigation.
PFJ is particularly angry that only six of the 11 major hospitals at the centre of the scandal have furnished the inquiry with information to date.
Health Minister Micheál Martin wants the Dunne Inquiry to complete the current phase and says he is willing to discuss the matter further with PFJ.
More than 15 families have now handed their files to the gardaí for criminal investigation and more are expected to do the same following today’s EGM.
PFJ also intends petitioning Attorney General Rory Brady for inquests that should have been conducted on dead children up to 15 years ago.
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