Justice for Bethany House victims

For how much longer will the Minister for Justice and Defence Alan Shatter continue to obfuscate and filibuster on the issue of those who were incarcerated in the Protestant-run Bethany home?

Despite being the principal facility for single Protestant pregnant women deemed in need of institutional care, Bethany was not considered a State residential institution and therefore the children born there have been excluded from the Residential Institutional Redress Act 2002. The remaining survivors of these institutions do not have time on their side and in many cases do not enjoy good health.

Minister Shatter has recently indicated his intention to address speedily the contentious issue of pardons for Irish soldiers who deserted their posts during the Second World War and enlisted with British forces. Might I remind the minister that unlike those deserters who had a choice on desertion, the children born in the Bethany home did not. Fate decreed their status. They have been innocent victims all their lives.