A REPORT into the deaths of children in State care that will be published within weeks is “very harrowing”, Minister for Children Frances Fitzgerald has said.
Ms Fitzgerald said the report would be published as soon as it had been given legal clearance.
An independent review into the deaths of children in care presented to the Government just before Christmas, but not yet published, found that 115 children died from unnatural causes while in State care between the years 2000 and 2010.
The report, compiled by a team under child law expert Geoffrey Shannon and Norah Gibbons of children’s charity Barnardos, was completed in just under a year but is being reviewed by the office of the Attorney General.
Speaking on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland, Ms Fitzgerald said she hoped to publish the report “in a number of weeks”. She paid tribute to Mr Shannon and Ms Gibbons for their work.
“It has to be cleared legally because clearly there are issues of confidentiality as far as the children are concerned, but I will publish that report once I get the legal clearance and we will have to learn the lessons.”
Ms Fitzgerald said both the Catholic Church and the State had failed children and she wanted to “turn over a new leaf, a new era of child protection” in the country.
The Government was committed to a standalone referendum on children’s rights this year. “Clearly there’s a number of referendums to be held and the exact timing has not been decided by Cabinet at this point,” she said.
Child protection was a priority, and this was why the Government planned to put child protection guidelines on a statutory basis. Under those guidelines, everyone would be put under an obligation to report cases of abuse.
On the Vatican report into abuse of children in Catholic dioceses here, published on Tuesday, the Minister said it addressed a number of important issues but it was unlikely the full document would be published. She conceded there probably was a need for more resources for the church’s own child safeguarding board in order that its own audits could be carried out promptly.
The Children’s Rights Alliance welcomed the Minister’s comments and said it would do all it could to support the Government in producing “a comprehensive wording and setting a date in 2012 for a referendum on children’s rights”.
Chief executive Tanya Ward said 2012 was the year families would “have a chance to put Ireland’s tragic past of institutional abuse against children behind them and to vote Yes for children”.
“Again, with the Vatican report’s publication yesterday, we are reminded of the urgent need to reform our Constitution and to take an important step on our journey to make Ireland one of the best places in the world to be a child,” Ms Ward said.