Madam, - This is a wonderful country, and I am profoundly grateful for the accident of lineage that gave me the privilege of living here. But it is also sometimes a bloody strange place.
Consider the case of Louise O'Keeffe. She and a large number of other children were molested by a teacher in a Church-run, State-funded school. Her abuser has admitted guilt and been sentenced. She took a successful case to the Redress Tribunal but decided to pursue the matter further through the courts. She lost. Then she lost her appeal to the Supreme Court on a divided judgement. The State pursued the matter of costs, which were awarded against her. As a result she and her family now face Christmas with a six figure debt hanging over them.,
Mr Justice Hardiman, acknowledging the difficult situation in which she found herself, said: "If any change was to be effective, it should be done by the legislature and not the courts." And so the buck passes. From the State to the church and back again via the courts to the legislature.
I have said on numerous occasions in the Senate that there was a need for a mechanism whereby, despite the constitutional separation of powers between the legislature and the judiciary, the Oireachtas could deal promptly and efficiently with matters brought before the courts that impinged on the rights of citizens. At the launch of the Irish Human Rights Commission's report a month or two ago, Dr Maurice Manning asked the Government to consider extending the IHRC's function in such ways so that, for example, it could give a human rights proofing to all prospective Government legislation.
Instead of this, however, the Government has abolished the Combat Poverty Agency, crippled the Equality Agency, spancelled the National Council on Racism and Integration and significantly reduced the function of the Irish Human Rights Commission, rather than expanding it.
And what of the Church? The sweetheart deal done in the aftermath of the wave of proven sexual abuse against children in its care has effectively let it off the hook and landed the financial liability in the lap of the taxpayer. Surely out of shame, if nothing else, the church must now step in and accept its responsibility in the case of this mother and her children.
And this dreadful situation coincides with the delayed and reluctant publication of the report into cases of alleged sexual abuse against children in the diocese of Cloyne. The report states that the diocese "failed to act effectively to limit the access to children by individuals against whom a credible complaint of child sex abuse was made".
The executive director of the One in Four Group is reported as saying that the Roman Catholic Church "cannot be trusted to consistently put the safety of children above all over considerations".
It is to my mind absolutely unbelievable that these self-same Church authorities retain their indefensible exemption from the provisions of the equality legislation. On top of that, even after the public exposure of their own disgraceful lack of responsibility in this very area, they are shameless in continuing to maintain publicly that same-sex couples are unfit to raise children.
It is high time that this Government faced these unpalatable facts and acted accordingly by removing the equality exemption and introducing civil marriage for gay people. - Yours, etc,
Senator DAVID NORRIS,
Seanad Éireann,
Dublin 2.