Mother and baby home redress scheme 'coldly' crafted to reduce costs for State

Children's Minister Roderic O'Gorman promised payments will be made as soon as possible.

The Government has been accused of "coldly and calculatedly" drawing up the mother and baby home redress scheme in a way that aims to reduce the cost to the State.

Children's Minister Roderic O'Gorman has defended the details of an €800m redress scheme which was signed off by ministers this week, and has promised that payments will be made as soon as possible.

However, speaking in the Dáil, Independent TD Catherine Connolly criticised the minister for excluding children who were resident in mother and baby homes for less than six months.

She said this decision is at odds with the view of a group of 34 expert clinicians who argued that trauma should not have a six-month minimum applied to it.

"Childhood trauma, which includes separation from primary caregivers and being exported to multiple caregivers in an institutional setting, has the greatest impact early in childhood," said Ms Connolly.

Thus, to state that young children who might have been in mother and baby homes for a period of two to three months early in life are less impacted than those who spent longer there is not scientifically correct. Indeed, the opposite is true.

Mr O'Gorman is "persisting with a scheme that maintains the imbalance of power and the division and is coldly and calculatedly directed at reducing costs", said the Galway TD.

Independent TD Catherine Connolly said Mr O'Gorman is persisting with a scheme that is 'coldly and calculatedly directed at reducing costs'. Picture: Collins Photos

"Forgive me if I am emotional, but also quite professional, on this matter. I have followed it at every level so far. I am asking my question in the hope that the Government has learned from the Ombudsman's report in 2017, which referred to a lost opportunity, and that we have learned from the cross-party recommendations, the Oak consultation process and many other documents."

Mr O'Gorman said he is "acutely aware" of the sense of urgency surrounding the establishment of the mother and baby institutions payment scheme and is focused on delivering the scheme as soon as possible.

He said the Government has sought to learn from previous schemes in drafting a system of redress for mother and baby home survivors.

We examined the residential institutions redress scheme, under which individuals had to appear before a committee to give evidence and face cross-examination. Everyone understands that that was a re-traumatising process.

He said payments will be based on the length of time in an institution.

"There will be no calling in, no questioning, and no re-traumatisation," he said. "This is the best way forward in trying to design a scheme that provides individuals with payments quickly — recognising the age of many people — and does not result in a re-traumatisation," Mr O'Gorman said.

He said that anyone who spent time in an institution for more than six months and was subsequently boarded out will be able to qualify under the scheme.