Áras Attracta outrage about culture and quality of care — time for action
I have worked in the intellectual disability sector in the UK and Ireland for almost 30 years advocating best practice and campaigning strongly against abusive practices in the care of people with intellectual disabilities.
I also acted as a key prosecution witness in a trial in Guildford Crown Court in the early 1990s which convicted a nurse of assaulting and abusing a person with intellectual disabilities who was living in a hospital for people with intellectual disabilities in Epsom, Surrey.
I also worked closely with those responsible for addressing serious criminal issues raised in the wake of The Winterbourne View abuse scandal in the UK.
What was shown on the RTÉ Primetime TV Exposé Bungalow 3 has been happening to the vulnerable in Irish society for over three centuries and is well documented.
We cannot blame the church or private or voluntary sector organisations on this occasion. These vulnerable individuals were abused in the HSe- run Áras Attracta whilst in the care of the State. The acts of violence, verbal abuse, cruelty and wilful neglect depicted in the RTÉ exposé are clearly criminal acts which happened in a modern purpose-built facility which was well staffed at the time.
This outrage is about the culture and quality of care. Some think that implementing the “HSE Congregated Settings Report” will be a panacea and prevent these appalling scandals happening. It won’t.
HIQA was set up in the wake of a previous TV programme exposing similar abuse in Leas Cross Nursing Home four years ago. HIQA has shown itself to be inadequate in this instance. HIQA gave this unit a clean bill of health earlier this year. To quote the Irish political philosopher Edmund Burke – “for evilt to exist all that it takes is that good people do nothing”.
Those who commit abuse whilst caring for the vulnerable in society, along with those who witness abuse and don’t report it, should be charged where the evidence exists. I think that HIQA and HSE investigations in the context of Áras Attracta should wait until criminal investigations are complete.
The Garda criminal investigation should be given precedence. Those who are managerially responsible within the HSE should also be charged with dereliction of duty, should evidence exist. It galls me why those in authority are never held properly accountable when wrongdoing occurs.
We don’t need further reports into abusive practices as we already have Winterbourne, Sutton and Merton, Death by Indifference, Francis, Murphy and Ryan Reports. We need action.
Finally there may be some questions for the RTÉ Investigative Unit. Was it necessary to film for three weeks? Why were the victims’ faces revealed in the programme and not those of the perpetrators?
At what point were the gardaí informed of this wrongdoing that occurred during the recording the of the programme? Has all the taped footage been handed over to the gardaí to enable a full case to prepared for the DPP? Why didn’t the researcher actually intervene?
I ask these questions as I was castigated under cross examination during the trial of a nurse found guilty of assault and the abuse of person with intellectual disability for taking 24 hours to report the incident to the relevant authorities.
In the light of the revelations about Áras Attracta, it seems we have a long way to go before we achieve the noble aspirations of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic as read by Pádraig Pearse in 1916.
That proclamation reads “[The] Republic guarantees religious and civil liberty, equal rights and equal opportunities to all its citizens, and declares its resolve to pursue the happiness and prosperity of the whole nation and of all its parts, cherishing all of the children of the nation equally”
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