Atheist Ireland Forum

Even though the indemnity deal has been discussed within other threads I felt it was too important an issue not to have its own thread. This deal will surely go down in Irish history as one of the greatest injustices of recent times.

Ahern defends indemnity deal over child abuse
Tuesday, October 24, 2006 Arhcive BreakingNews.ie
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern tonight defended a controversial 2002 indemnity deal with religious institutions at the centre of child abuse allegations.

Under the agreement, a total of 18 religious congregations were granted indemnity from any future litigation by victims in return for a 128 million euro contribution to a compensation fund.

Labour leader Pat Rabbitte claimed in the Dáil that Mr Ahern didn’t comply with Cabinet procedures or properly consult with the Attorney General on the issue.

Mr Ahern said: “It’s sad what happened in those days. You argue that they shouldn’t be paid or should take the land off the Church. It’s not a road I go down. I’ll make no apology to the House or anybody else the way we did it.

While people browse through this site it is a topic that should be noticed. People need to know what type of leaders we have and the injustices perpetrated by our Governments and the Cathloic Church. The people get abused and end up paying for it out of their own pockets. Claims for abuse have reached over a €1 billion. The church only paid €128million which is nothing to them.Look at all the property they own. The balance is being paid by the taxpayer. Bertie ultimately saved the Catholic Church in Ireland.

Shouldn’t something be held each year to mark the anniversary of the Indemnity Deal. Michael Woods, who engineered the deal "for us" recently saw a deal go through which will give him extra money on his already large pension. Dirty work but it pays well.


The Redress Board:
http://www.paddydoyle.com/president.html

Tony O'Reilly, owner of the Herald and the Independent, backs the church.
http://www.catholicireland.net/pages/in ... 57&art=712

The commission on child abuse:
http://www.indymedia.ie/article/76601

PR from the paedophile ring:
http://www.cps.dublindiocese.ie/cat_index_12.shtml

http://clericalwhispers.blogspot.com/20 ... f-sex.html


While the overall compensation package will cost €1.1 billion, the controversial deal the religious orders struck with the state limits their liability to €128m — of which only €76.8m has been paid.

The rest of this figure was agreed to be paid by the taxpayer.


it seems any increased cost in councilling/redress schemes are also born by the taxpayer

Instead of paying half of the compensation fund for thousands of sex abuse victims, as originally planned, the Catholic Church is paying just a tenth of the total compensation because of the deal.

It was agreed that €128m would be paid by the Church of the original €254m compensation cost envisaged by the Government.

Brigid McManus of the Department of Education told the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee (PAC) the total received from religious institutions to date is €76.8m. She said of the €66m agreed to be handed over in property deeds, just a third of this, or €19.5m, has been received.

When the board was established in 2002, the Government estimated there would be 2,000 people eligible for compensation. While Ms McManus did not say how many cases have been dealt with, she said there are still 4,000 cases to be processed. Last year’s figures show 14,500 victims applied for compensation.

The scheme was set up following a public apology to victims by the Taoiseach in May 1999.

The Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse is expected to publish its report in October.

And when the bold Bertie recently announced his resignation, with a fat wad of our cash forever heading into his pension fund, no one mentioned the Indemnity Deal. The single greatest betrayal of the Irish people since the founding of the state and no one dares to mention it. How long before we have a Bertie Bridge across the Liffey or an Ahearn Port Tunnel?

No one raised an eyebrow when it turned out the CCL had taken out insurance long before the reign of child rape was made public knowledge. Next week some apologist like Diarmid Martin will be telling us the CCL is the only place we can derive our morals from otherwise our children will all become depraved atheists.

there was few mentions in the paper praising him for his apology, but people like paddy doyle wrote a long letter in the times pointing out he had to do after the tv programs making clear how much cover up there been.

Apologys are one of the most cowardly little tricks anyone can pull.

I just screwed you all out of €1 billion to pay for child rape carried out by the Catholic Church ooopsss Sorry!

The Inquisition, hundreds of years of torture rape and robbery.....ooops Sorry!
Seventeen hundred years percecuting the Jews......oooooops Sorry!

The Crusades, hundreds of years of bloody and savage religious warfare....ooops Sorry!

Preaching charity and care for the poor all the while dancing off with millions in unpaid taxes and billions in property ooooops Sooo Oh No that's not on the list!

Can this indemnity deal be undone? As the Irish Catholic Church has not kept its side of the deal can government and of course we the taxpayers change the terms of the agreement. – Just wondering - any lawyers out there?

Re the O'Reilly article.....where's the bucket.
Ed.

http://www.secularism.org.uk/irelandsfa ... hefin.html

there was an piece on this morning pat kenny show i think about
the Magdalene laundries etc, from this guy who wrote a book about the issue

how the state used them to get rid of people it didn't like...
not just young mothers, but mentally ill etc etc, it was used by the state to get rid people it didn't want to acknowledge, there were many cases of infanticide in ireland at the time, if the women agreed to go to a laundry instead of prison they could and the gov didn't have record that the infanticide happened, but of course it was harder to get out of magdelene laundry then a prison! so many never left so institutionalised they were, the author said he had the names of people buried in glasnevin or limerick that were women who went to laundaries instead of prison and died there, when they could have left prison much earlier, he said in 2002 michael woods stood up in the dail and refused to acknowledge them or the govs responsibilty to them.

he mentioned the 'corrigan report?', i missed the start of it but it was a report written by some priest where the basis was that everything not perfect by the church's holy standards should be suppressed we shouldn't just aspire to holy standards we should enforce em now, well he put it a better way, so every deviance should be curtailed and it suggest flogging be brought back for any deviancy etc.

and this was the basis of the church/state response to the abuses, the were to be shussh, hidden, the abused were to shunned and out away, that children testimony was noted to be worth nothing along with womens. many womens organisation, health, poverty,social, gave submission to report and they were left as footmote on the report.... must find more about it.

I did read somwhere that based on the fact the CCL acted in bad faity in not revelaing they already had insurance there was a basis for cancelling the deal. But anyone who thinks that might happen should bet on Shamrock Rovers beating Barcelona in the Olympics at basketball next Tuesday after Bertie Ahearn is found shagging the Pope.

perhaps those recent document connell was trying to keep of a hold of is where that is revealed in detail.

That they had insurance beforehand is already well known. We are run by the political wing of the CCL. It can't think of a worse indictment of the Irish people the fact that they not only stood by while they got screwed a second time but voted back in the people who screwed them.

ah it was the carrigan report and the book is

Ireland's Magdalen Laundries and the Nation's Architecture of Containment
by James M. Smith
http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/ulib/pubhi ... laundries/
audio interview

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Irelands-Magdal ... 026804127X

he blames the state primarily but the 'carrigan report' reinforces the idea there weren't separate back then.

more info /reviews of book
http://undpress.nd.edu/book/P01180
http://www.americancatholic.org/Messeng ... /books.asp

here's the interview from PK
http://dynamic.rte.ie/quickaxs/209-rte- ... esday.smil

Carrigan a justice of the state wrote the report on containing sexual deviancy

the author describe how nobody was allowed to see the carrigan report and handful of copies were printed yet...

Carrigan Report was the
basis for the Criminal Law Amendment Act
1935 (Amending the 1885 Act in a number
of aspects).

some of its aspect
http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache:to ... cd=1&gl=uk

Between 1922 and 1981 this was the only
piece of legislation of any significance on
sexual crime

http://www.popline.org/docs/1534/279914.html

Disposing of sexualized women and children in religious institutions rendered the compromising reality of their existence invisible. In return, the nation secured its identity as a Catholic and morally pure society.

this included passing laws that didn't go through the dail because that would involve be talking about moral decline.

Reopening of redress agreement not ruled out
RTE News Thursday, 21 May 2009 22:13

The Tánaiste has refused to rule out reopening the agreement with the religious orders on redress payments to the victims of child abuse.

Mary Coughlan said all matters raised by the report of the Commission into Child Abuse would be discussed at a special meeting of the Government next week.

Despite being asked several times, she declined to either confirm or deny that reopening the compensation deal would form part of the Government's discussions.

However, Minister for Education Batt O'Keeffe has ruled out a renegotiation of the Church's liabilities to compensate survivors.

Minister O'Keeffe told RTÉ News this evening that such a move would be impossible.

The Taoiseach has said the report has outlined in graphic detail a horrendous and appalling vista of abuse in institutions all over the country.

Brian Cowen said the Department of Education would have to take its share of responsibility for what happened.

However, he added that the Government has not yet determined if compensation deals for the abused, which were agreed previously, could be re-opened.

The Taoiseach said the Government would meet next week to see in what way they could consider the recommendations made in the report.

Under the deal, the contribution of the religious orders to the Redress Scheme was capped at €127m - it is estimated that the State will end up paying around ten times that amount.

Redress issue raised in Dáil

This morning, Opposition parties were critical of current child protection practices, claiming that enough still had not been done by the State.

There was no political disagreement on the gravity of the issues raised by yesterday's report from the Commission into Child Abuse.

There was also no disagreement on the need for a comprehensive Dáil debate on the report - it will take place after the 5 June elections.

Tánaiste Mary Coughlan repeated the apology from the State to the victims of child abuse, first made by then Taoiseach Bertie Ahern ten years ago, and she said the report posed issues for the State and the religious orders and for wider society.

Fine Gael's Richard Bruton said the report showed that the State ignored allegations at the time and was still failing children because the 1999 protection guidelines still are not being applied.

Labour's Eamon Gilmore called for a revisiting of the deal with the religious orders, under which their contribution to the redress scheme.

Sinn Féin's Caoimghín Ó Caoláin said child abuse was still with us and recommendations like those in the Monageer report must be implemented.

President McAleese has expressed deep sadness at the findings of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse Report.

Welcoming the publication of the Report and its comprehensive nature, the President said 'It is shocking and shameful that so many children had to endure such appalling suffering and abuse in institutions whose obligation and vocation it was to provide them with safe and loving care.'

Mrs McAleese said it was an atrocious betrayal of love.

'My heart goes out to the victims of this terrible injustice,' she said, 'an injustice compounded by the fact that they had to suffer in silence for so long.'

Comment provokes anger

Some child protection groups have criticised comments last night by the new Archbishop of Westminster Vincent Nichols.

When asked about the contents of the report from the Child Abuse Commission, he described it as distressing and disturbing but said it had taken courage for members of the clergy to face up to the facts in their past.

However, he said that the report should not overshadow all of the good that they had also done.

Archbishop Nichols said 'his heart went out to the victims of abuse and said all perpetrators should be held to account'.

Michelle Elliot, of the British child protection charity Kidscape, criticised the remarks and said he should have just made a straightforward apology.

Vincent Nichols was installed as the Archbishop of Westminster this afternoon, thereby becoming leader of the Catholic Church in England and Wales.

Rise in calls to helplines

Organisations that counsel victims of child abuse have been dealing with an increase in the number of calls to their helplines.

The surge follows the publication yesterday afternoon of the report detailing the abuse suffered by thousands of children in residential institutions.

Counselling services said the publication of the report had opened old wounds for many, and they received calls from people who had never spoken of their abuse before.

The services had extra straff on duty to deal with the increase in calls to their helplines.

The report, of almost 3,000 pages, details how thousands of children in residential institutions run by religious congregations lived in a climate of fear.

Later this month a report on clerical sex abuse in Dublin is due out.

It is expected to highlight the torment of thousands more victims and helpline providers say they will be putting on extra staff then as well.

The HSE offers a free National Counselling Service for anyone who has suffered childhood abuse on 1800 235 234.

The related Connect service, for out of hours contact, is on 1800 235 235 from the Republic of Ireland (freephone)
00800 235 235 55 from Britain and Northern Ireland (free from landlines).
http://www.connectcounselling.ie

Dublin Rape Crisis Centre operates a 24-hour helpline on 1800 77 88 88.

Fresh calls to revise abuse compensation
BreakingNews.ie 21/05/2009 - 18:16:29

The Government today faced calls to revise its capped compensation scheme for thousands of victims of clerical child abuse.

A deal struck by the Fianna Fáil-led coalition in 2002 limited the amount religious orders would pay at €127m, but the state could end up paying 10 times that amount.

The cabinet will hold a special meeting next Tuesday to discuss the damning findings from yesterday’s five-volume Ryan Inquiry on decades of physical, sexual and emotional abuse in institutions run by religious orders.

But Tánaiste Mary Coughlan refused to confirm if a revised compensation deal would be on the table.

A full Dáil debate is also timetabled for the week following the local and European elections.

“This report poses issues for the state on how the state discharged its responsibilities, it poses issues for religious orders and it poses issues for our wider society,” Ms Coughlan said.

“I believe we should carefully reflect on its contents.”

The special cabinet meeting has been arranged for ministers to discuss the recommendations, existing child protection policies and what improvements can be made.

More than 5,000 children are in care in Ireland today with about 90% living in foster families.

Children’s Minister Barry Andrews said the state has taken control of 61 properties from religious orders.

“If there is a moral obligation that is something the church should discharge themselves,” he told RTÉ Radio.

“I have no difficulty in sharing the sense of outrage that all of us have.

“I think that the church have acknowledged and apologised for all of this and I think you are talking about a moral obligation.”

In the Dáil, Labour leader Eamon Gilmore called for the 2002 indemnity deal with religious orders to be reviewed.

“It was concluded in circumstances in which no memorandum was brought to Government about the issue.

“We are also told that the then attorney general was not directly involved in the matter,” he said.

Sinn Féin TD Caoimhghín O Caoláin called for a Dáil debate on the report as soon as possible, while Fine Gael deputy leader Richard Bruton called for two sitting days to be allocated.

“This report is of great importance and probably addresses the most profound issues ever inquired into by the institutions of the State,” said Mr O Caoláin.

Mr Bruton also called for forthcoming child protection legislation to be fast-tracked through the Oireachtas.

Meanwhile, one of the religious orders responsible for abuse and neglect detailed in the report, apologised.

Sister Mary Christian, superior general of the Sisters of Charity, said: “We repeat that we are absolutely and deeply sorry that children in our care were abused in any way,” she said.

“Nothing we say can make up to them for the pain and hurt they experienced. We also acknowledge the staff, volunteers and Sisters who did their very best to provide a caring and nurturing environment for the children, under very difficult circumstances.”

Meanwhile the Department of Education and Science tonight clarified that it has a duty to pay out every cent of each compensation award stipulated by the Redress Board.

Read more: "Fresh calls to revise abuse compensation | BreakingNews.ie" - http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/fres ... GBVjsuWJ&A