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	Liberators Are on the March and the Nation Should Fall in behind Them By Fergus Finlay Irish Examiner June 2, 2009 http://www.irishexaminer.com/story.aspx?id=93157&m=5.3.2.0&h=liberators-are-on-the-march-and-the-nation-should-fall-in-behind-them I HOPE tens of thousands of people march tomorrow week. That’s the day when the survivors of institutional abuse in Ireland are planning to lead a dignified and silent solidarity march from the GPO to Leinster House. Let me go back to the beginning. I don’t want to refer to the people who will be leading this solidarity march as survivors. By their actions they forced open gates that many would prefer stayed locked forever. They forced open gates they were locked behind themselves, and they forced open gates of silence. Their courage in speaking out and campaigning allowed us to see eventually what they have always known. That courage has made thousands of people free – free from untruth, free from the cowardice that characterised relations between church and state, free from the scarring of emotional, physical and sexual abuse. It has liberated them from the hypocrisy and shame with which we have always sought to deny the hideous reality of what was done in our name and on our behalf. So I don’t think we should refer to the people who confronted the cruelty of the past as survivors. I think we should call them liberators. The march will be a march of liberation. I’m hoping that people like Joe Duffy, who has done a wonderful job of allowing space to the liberators ever since the Ryan report was published, will help to build national support for the solidarity day. If his and other radio programmes can get momentum going, perhaps employers could be encouraged to allow some time off for people who want to take part. Perhaps public transport facilities could be made free for the day to allow all of us to make a tiny gesture of solidarity. The leaders of this day have chosen to start the march from the GPO because it’s a living symbol of the republic. It was on the steps of the GPO that the proclamation of independence was read out. It was there that Irish people heard, for the very first time, the ringing exhortation that "the republic guarantees religious and civil liberty, equal rights and equal opportunities to all its citizens, and declares its resolve to pursue the happiness and prosperity of the whole nation and all of its parts, cherishing all of the children of the nation equally…" There could be no better place, surely, for the people of Ireland to show solidarity with thousands of children who were never cherished at all. Children of the republic, abandoned by the republic. And the march will go from there to Leinster House, the centre-piece of our democracy. If there is a place where citizens can gather to demand justice, to demand change, to be heard saying "never again", then Leinster House is – or ought to be – that place. The people who will lead the rest of us on that day – the liberators – demand only justice. Now has to be their time. The Government has said it will meet the liberators before it meets the religious orders. But on June 10, government and opposition alike have an opportunity to commit themselves to justice. On June 10 the Dail is scheduled to debate the Report of the Committee to Inquire into Child Abuse. Members of the House will, I hope, confront that debate not just as legislators, not just as professional people weighed down by all sorts of problems. They can also react as parents, as people who can recognise the hurt endured by children. I hope that before any member of the House speaks in the debate, he or she will read at least one chapter of the Ryan commission’s report. It would make sense, in fact, for members to read the chapters that refer to institutions in or near their constituencies. They are all easily accessible in the version of the report that is now on the internet at www.childabusecommission.com. There the report is broken down under headings that directly relate to the institutions. Artane. Letterfrack. Tralee. Carriglea (that’s in Dun Laoghaire). Glin. Salthill. Cabra. Daingean (in Co Offaly). Marlborough House (a place of unremitting brutality almost directly run by the Department of Education in Glasnevin). Upton in Cork and Ferryhouse in Clonmel – both run by the Rosminian order. Greenmount in Cork. Lota in Cork, where children with intellectual disabilities were sexually abused. Goldenbridge. Cappoquin. Clifden. Newtownforbes. Dundalk. St Patrick’s and St Joseph’s in Kilkenny. St Mary’s in Cabra, and Beechpark, both schools that catered for children who were deaf. There is, of course, lots more to the report, and all of it is accessible. It isn’tpossible to read it in its totality without coming to the conclusion there is work here for legislators to do, and hopefully that work will start during the Dail debate. The work divides itself into two broad parts. The first is the expression of solidarity, the commitment to justice, the determination to ensure everyone involved in the evil and corrupt system of childcare now exposed in detail will be forced to face their full measure of responsibility. The other part of the work lies in the phrase "never again". A number of organisations that work in the field of child protection and childcare now, and other organisations that know only too well what happens when the rights of children are ignored, have come together around the principle that we must never again allow children to be ignored or hidden away. Over the past week or so, we have met every political party in Leinster House, both government and opposition. We have encountered a huge degree of recognition that things have to change if children are to be protected, properly and as they should be, from neglect, abuse or exploitation. It is also very clear from those meetings that the political system as a whole recognises that things are very far from where they should be, even today. OUR laws are inadequate, our systems are poor, the people who work on the ground are under-resourced. Everyone knows the only alternative to putting children in care is better family support – and everyone knows too that sometimes, despite everyone’s best efforts, children are more at risk in their own homes and families than anywhere else. Addressing this dilemma can’t be done without resources. But it also requires legislative and constitutional change. Now is the time, if we really mean it when we say "never again", for us to tackle those issues. But first and foremost, now is the time for justice. I sat on the panel on RTE’s Questions & Answers when Michael O’Brien spoke passionately and truthfully from the audience. And as he spoke it was clear this was a man whose commitment to seeking justice is nothing but admirable. He has been dismissed over the years and, like others, belittled as a seeker after compo. But people like him – and Christine Buckley and John Kelly and others – spend a lot of their lives working for other survivors. Compo means nothing to them – what they want and what they have sought to deliver for others is freedom from pain. It’s another reason to call them liberators.
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