HSE seeks AG’s opinion on publication of ‘Grace’ reports

The HSE has called on the Government’s most senior legal official to provide it with evidence showing why it must publish two detailed reports into the Grace foster abuse scandal, amid an ongoing stand-off between the State bodies.

A HSE spokesperson made the request after it emerged that the attorney general, Máire Whelan, has concluded there is no legal impediment to publishing either report.

The Irish Examiner yesterday revealed that Ms Whelan has told cabinet there is nothing preventing the HSE from publishing the 2012 Conal Devine and 2015 Resilience Ireland reports into claims serious sexual abuse claims were covered up by health service officials for two decades. The claims relate to the case of a woman with severe mental and physical disabilities given the pseudonym ‘Grace’, who was allegedly subjected to repeated extreme sexual abuse from the early 1990s until 2009 while at a Waterford-based foster home.