Bethany Home injustice rankles
CATHOLIC religious orders lobbied the State to relax the rules in order to ensure more of their institutions were belatedly covered under the child abuse redress scheme.
Meanwhile, similar institutions, like the Protestant-run Bethany Home, met with blunt refusals to allow its survivors benefit from the compensation scheme.
The result was that a Catholic-run mother and baby home in Dublin was covered by the indemnity deal, while the Protestant-run mother and baby home was not.
The feeling of injustice held by the Bethany survivors will only worsen following the revelations in last night’s documentary by the RTÉ Investigations Unit.
Newly uncovered material underscored the disparity and conflicted with the findings of the only public inquiry carried out on the indemnity deal between 18 Catholic orders and the State.
In the case of 13 extra Catholic institutions, added to a list of 123 covered bodies in late 2004, the State initially did not see the merits of bringing them into the fold. But official reluctance was worn down by campaigning for the orders.
Then, after it backed down, the Department of Education played down the potential costs of its decision to the Dáil Public Accounts Committee, which was investigating the deal. This was despite internal reservations that the additional institutions, which the religious orders wanted to get included, did not meet the legal requirements.
The key question was whether or not the State had a supervisory role in their operation. It appears the Catholic bodies did not have a compelling case.
Previously it was understood the 2004 decision to add 13 orders to the redress scheme, was a foregone conclusion. The PAC was told the bodies should have legitimately been part of the deal when it was signed in Jun 2002.
However, petitioning letters, sent by the Daughters of Charity to the Department of Education, showed that two years after the indemnity deal was signed a different view was taken. No records were found to suggest the State supervised the additional institutions. Nevertheless, the next year the State picked up the bill.
The apparent largesse, in allowing questionable cases, came when it was already known that the €128m the orders had offered would fall well short of the 50:50 burden-sharing target. However, the orders still used that contribution as leverage to convince officials.
The deference to the Catholic orders is also evident in separate freedom of information documents released to the Irish Examiner.
These show that the State did not want to add to the original 123-institution list unless the religious orders increased their controversial €128m offer. But a demand that they pay more was set aside when the orders said, no.
When it came to bodies like the Bethany Home the position was very different.
Ultimately, in 2009, a memo prepared for then-taoiseach Brian Cowen shows that the Government decided there would be no further extension of the redress scheme and the Cabinet was told if it was to be broadened the cost would be enormous.
However, in 2005 the chief state solicitors office said there were fewer than 100 cases active in the courts that fell outside the original redress act but would be included after the expanded list. Figures available elsewhere suggest the 100-case estimate was a very low figure, even using information available to the State at the time.
Overall, the State felt compelled to relent to the Catholic orders in part because of a lack of clarity during the negotiation of the indemnity deal.
In Mar 2002, two months after an agreement in principle was already signed, internal memos show that the orders flagged their desire to discuss extra coverage. But the State was still coming to terms with the legal scope of the indemnity deal which, although agreed, was not universally understood.
Eleven years later the likes of St Philomena’s enjoyed the protection of redress, while the campaign to include Bethany Home is ongoing.
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