Dempsey's dithering on abuse defies belief: ThePost.ie


TCH Archives > Sunday Business Post > 2004/01/18 > Dempsey's dithering on abuse defies belief

Dempsey's dithering on abuse defies belief
Sunday, January 18, 2004
By Vincent Browne
All the tribunals are in trouble. All are costing multiples of the original estimates. All are taking years longer than anticipated. Some appear to have lost their way.

The two tribunals on the Garda Siochana, another tribunal on corruption in the planning process and a fourth on pay ments to C harles Haughey and Michael Lowry are to continue unimpeded.

The only inquiry to have its terms of reference pared back is the one inquiring into the abuse of children in residential institutions. And that was the tribunal which, alone, was delayed for years in its work by the Department of Education, then obstructed by the same department and most recently left in limbo for a year, for what turns out to have been for no reason at all (or little enough reason).

It took the government almost two years to deal with the issue of compensation for victims of institutional child abuse.Ittookalmosttwoyears to deal with the elementary issue of legal costs for those coming before the investigation committee of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse.

In July 2002, Ms Justice Mary Laffoy,then chairperson of the commission, proposed the investigation committee would operate on four parallel strands, with the objective of bringing the investigations to aconclusion by the end of 2005, ie within three and a half years. The Department of Education and Science took six months to examine the proposal and then decided on a review of the remit of the commission.

Laffoy, quite reasonably, pointed out that this left her in adilemma.Was sheto continue the work of the investigation committee, in the context of a review which might make the work then being undertaken redundant?

The secretary general of the Department of Education imperiously advised her on the legal situation: she was to continue with her work. Several months later the Minister for Education gave her precisely the opposite advice.

The promised review was promptly completed by Rory Brady, the Attorney General, last February. He proposed certain changes to the commission's rules of evidence. This was agreed by the minister and the government. Heads of a new bill were drafted.The minister then changed his mind and ordered a further review (the claim that this was necessary because of a constitutional challenge to the commission is bogus because that challenge was commenced before Rory Brady had completed his review).

Nothing appears to have been done until July. Then the department wrote to Laffoy asking questions that surely should have been addressed when the first review was undertaken - the nature of allegations of abuse made against institutions and individuals; the age profile of those making complaints; the number of dead individuals against whom allegations of abuse were made, and so on.

In fact, because of a review of its remit in December 2002, the investigation committee ceased its hearings and, we may presume, ceased its background work as well, for this could have proved a waste of time, once the new terms of reference were decided.

Now it is agreed, following the recommendations of the new chairman of the commission, Mr Justice Sean Ryan, that the investigation work into all cases should continue and a proportion of such cases then taken to hearings.

But because of the dithering of Noel Dempsey from December 2002 until now (at least) a further year has been lost. Worse than that, the legal team of the commission has been dispersed, which means that, with a new chairman and a new legal team, it will take months if not yet another year for the commission to get back to where it was in December 2002.

And the work saved by the proposal to bring to hearings only a proportion of the cases investigated, may prove negligible, as Dempsey appeared to concede last Thursday.

A further point on this: Laffoy proposed that hearings should run in four parallel strands. The government agreed "in principle" to this in December 2002. Now there are to be only three strands.

So in July 2002, Laffoy made proposals to speed up the work of the investigation committee of the commission, including the running of four parallel strands.

Five months later, Dempsey said the government agreed with this "in principle". He then set in motion a review that reported within two months. He accepted the review's recommendations and then changed his mind within a week.

He instituted a further review and this caused the work of the investigation committee to be curtailed for a year.

This further review took a further ten months. In the meantime the chairperson of the commission resigned and the legal team dispersed.

Now a change of procedures has been agreed that might in one respect speed up the work of the commission (the decision not to bring to hearings all the cases that are to be investigated) and in another respect will certainly delay the work of the commission (the decision to operate in three parallel strands, not four as proposed by Laffoy and, apparently, agreed by the government in December 2002).

And this rank incompetence and indecisiveness takes place in relation to a commission investigating the abuse of some of the most vulnerable people in the state - children committed by the state to residential institutions run by religious orders.

The inquiries into planning, payments to senior politicians and alleged Garda misconduct are permitted to sail on unimpeded.

There is feverish anxiety over the costs of the child abuse inquiry, resignation over the costs of the other inquiries. The planning tribunal may take another 15 years. The costs could be astronomical.

The expectation that the tribunal will be able to recover its own costs from obstructive witnesses appears compromised first by the nature of the findings in the much lauded First Interim Report by Mr Justice Flood.

Indeed there is a possibility that the costs of these obstructive witnesses may be fixed on the state, in which case the costs to date would certainly be well over €100 million and that would be a mere downpayment on the total costs that will be involved.

The Moriarty Tribunal is engaged in an inquiry into the awarding of the second mobile phone licence. The only issue here is whether Michael Lowry interfered with the awarding of the licence in return for payments.

While there may have been payments, it has not been established that he had any influence in the awarding of the phone licence. And as costs mount up and up, seemingly to be fixed on the public exchequer, there is no hint of concern from the government.

The Morris Tribunal is bogged down in the mire of the Donegal shenanigans.This too is way behind its own schedule. Costs are mounting and again not a breath of concern.

The antics at the BarrTribunal, enquiring into the killing of John Carthy at Abbeylara in April 2000 are also causing costs to escalate and, again, not a word of concern.

What is going on here?

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