Organ retention inquiry may stop at three hospitals

A €20 million inquiry into the retention by hospitals of organs of dead children may never look beyond the three hospitals it took five years to investigate.

This was indicated yesterday by Tánaiste and Health Minister Mary Harney, who said the report given to her by inquiry chairperson, barrister Anne Dunne, may contain enough information from its examination of just three hospitals to satisfy those seeking an inquiry.

“I don’t want to prejudge what will happen, but it may well be that we can draw conclusions from what happened here that doesn’t require us to investigate every single hospital.

“I know when I met the chairperson in October, she mentioned that she was dealing with the three children’s hospitals and there are a further 196 hospitals.

“But if it’s taken five years to do three hospitals, I wouldn’t even like to think how long it would take to do 196 hospitals, so we have to be realistic as well.”

Speaking at a press conference at the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) AGM in Killarney yesterday, the Tánaiste said she didn’t want the work of the inquiry to fall by the wayside, as has happened with other inquiries. She wanted it to be brought to a satisfactory, but not premature conclusion.

The Tánaiste will not make a final decision on handing the inquiry over to someone else to continue Ms Dunne’s work until she has read the report. Ms Dunne’s role in the inquiry was terminated last month.

Both the Tánaiste and Parents for Justice had expressed exasperation at its slow pace and high cost.

The Tánaiste had hoped to bring Ms Dunne’s report to Cabinet on Wednesday week, but said this may not be possible because of its size. The report itself is contained in three boxes but there are 51 boxes of appendices.

The Tánaiste said she and Ms Dunne were “not in agreement” about why the report had taken so long.