By Geraldine Collins and Michael Brennan
Irish Independent [Ireland]
March 23, 2007
http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=9&si=1799148&issue_id=15402
The compensation bill for victims of child abuse is set to cost taxpayers over €1bn.
Education Minister Mary Hanafin revealed last night that the Residential Institutions Redress Board will require a further €600m in addition to the €564m it had already received.
She said the total estimated cost had now reached €1.16bn but the final bill would not be known until the board completed its work in three years' time.
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| Mary Hanafin |
Last night Fine Gael education spokeswoman Olwyn Enright said the Government had denied for years that the scheme would cost €1bn.
"Now, when you look at the proportionality, effectively the taxpayer is going to cough up a billion. The Government did a deal without knowing the liability - that's why I think it's a bad deal."
The State is now set to pay more than 10 times the €128m the Catholic Church handed over as part of a deal reached in 2002.
Some 18 religious congregations which managed the orphanages and industrial schools paid the sum in return for an indemnity against future legal actions by former residents.
The State accepted it also had a responsibility by having placed the children in the Church's care rather than choosing to look after them itself.
Ms Enright said the State should not have capped the Church's liability at €128m when it did not know what its final liability would be.
"I don't blame only Michael Woods [former education minister] because Bertie knew about it as well."
Since the board was set up in 2002, it has made payments to more than 7,000 people who suffered physical, sexual or mental abuse while attending state or church-run institutions.
However, it still has almost 7,000 more applications to process.
Ms Hanafin told the Dail that the average award to date was about €70,000, with up to €300,000 paid out in some cases. She said that of the €128m promised by the religious orders, the cash and counselling contributions of €51m had been received in full. Another €66m in property transfers and €10.7m in lieu of property had also been agreed, and the balance of €160,000 was to be settled shortly.
Ms Hanafin said the value assigned to the church properties awaiting transfer was the value at the time of the agreement and not the current value.
However, she was unable to provide Ms Enright with the valuation of 16 properties handed over to the Department of Education by the religious orders.
The Board suffered a setback last year with the death of its chairman Judge Sean O'Leary.
It received thousands of extra applications before its December 2005 deadline. Another 166 applications have been received since the deadline passed, but the Board has the discretion to accept them if there are exceptional circumstances.
The most recent figures show the has made 5,256 offers so far to victims following settlement talks and 1,567 awards.
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