Foster care correspondence: Papers suggest more yet to come

Since early February, Finance Minister Michael Noonan has sidestepped questions over whether he had any role in the decision 20 years ago to allow a woman with significant intellectual disabilities to remain at an abusive foster home.

Mr Noonan and Taoiseach Enda Kenny have both told the Irish Examiner at press conferences in recent days that all Department of Health information about what happened in 1996 which led to the woman known as ‘Grace’ being left at the home has been made public. “No additional information” is available, as one Fine Gael spokesperson put it.

However, correspondence to and from the then health minister seen by this newspaper show this is not the full story, with the developing situation now likely to form a central part of the promised State investigation into the tragic case.