Report into - Brothers of Charity in County Galway.

Is fear of upsetting errant grown-ups more important than safeguarding children with Down's or autism?
By Medb Ruane
Saturday December 15 2007

You don't release a report about the abuse of intellectually disabled children two weeks before Christmas if you want it to get the attention it deserves. Or do you?

On Friday, Minister Jimmy Devins decided to have an inquiry into why it took eight years to report into alleged abuses at Kilcornan and at the Holy Family School/Woodlands residential centre, both run by the Brothers of Charity in County Galway. The report was released on Tuesday.

The delay is one of many points that are not explained or not quite clarified in the story of how the most vulnerable children suffered in two schools up to 1998.

The children began life at a disadvantage because of autism, Down's syndrome or other intellectual disabilities. Parents such as Keith Duffy are trying to promote better understanding of such developmental disorders now.

But don't think this is a same-old, same-old story of abuse in ancient Ireland and that it's almost resolved. Don't imagine that Bertie Ahern's apology and setting up the redress and residential institutions boards made the suffering go away.

Little in the report could assure people it can't happen again. Yes, soothing sounds were being made by the HSE and some positive action being taken by the Brothers of Charity, who apologised for what went on and whose Galway services received e47.5 million from the HSE in 2007.

But questions remain, including a soft-soaping of figures that makes the scale and cruelty of the abuse look milder, in my view, than needs be.

This matters because the appetite for doing "something" about abuse is waning. There's a misplaced sense that "it" must be fixed by now and that those who drone on about it need to get a life.

In fact, some people who work in residential care still have not secured Garda clearance. The HSE hasn't changed its service level agreements with disability service providers so as to make these basic requirements mandatory for agencies it funds.

Is fear of upsetting or embarrassing errant grown-ups more important than safeguarding children with Down's or autism?

We don't know because there's no appropriate inspection system for people and places that care for children with intellectual disabilities. Children must wait while the Health Information and Quality Authority prepares itself to urge the HSE to take "all possible action to ensure the quality and safety of these services".

What does this mean? Citizens pay taxes on the understanding of best practice, only to discover that necessary safeguards are not being made?

This report connects with a wider attitude to intellectually disabled children and adults that leaves them virtually without rights. Alan Shatter told Drivetime of how a sexual assault case was dismissed on the grounds that the alleged victim, who had Down's syndrome, was unfit to give evidence, because of the method of evidence taking. He believes the law needs to change.

Children in Kilcornan and Woodlands were beaten with planks and pool cues, buggered and violated, left to endure silently. Of 18 brothers and lay staff accused by people who spoke to this non-judicial inquiry, only two prosecutions were made. One involves a notorious predatory paedophile who was about to be interviewed by Gardai when he was spirited away to a Brothers of Charity house in Waterford before being sent to the congregation in Liverpool.

The man later admitted sexually abusing hundreds of children, so many he couldn't recall the exact number or names. He's in prison.

The McCoy Report -- Dr Kevin McCoy took over as Chair after a surprising number of committee members resigned -- details the bare facts of this abuser, known as Adult A, but doesn't follow the trail of accountability within the congregation.

So no one knows whether hiding abuse and abusers was a practice within the order, whether others were held accountable, or if similar abuses happened in other Brothers of Charity centres in Waterford, Cork and Limerick. No one has to know officially because service level agreements don't ask and the service providers won't tell.

The Report states at least twice that the number of alleged abuses it investigated represents 2pc of all the children who lived in Kilcornan and 4pc who lived in Holy Family/Woodlands. Not too bad then -- until you add in a further 133 people who couldn't speak to the inquiry because they took their cases to the Redress Board, and others who did not come forward.

With their rights sidelined, children and adults with intellectual disabilities are exposed far beyond the protections other citizens take for granted.

The great children's campaigner Margaret Kennedy got nowhere with successive Ministers for Health when she asked about the Galway allegations. She points to US research findings that children with intellectual disabilities are three times as likely as other children to be abused physically and sexually.

Moving faster than any politician in months, Minister Devins will appoint a senior public servant within days to ask hard questions about what happened and, perhaps, to focus public attention on the special legal and care needs of children with intellectual disabilities.

People still live at Kilcornan. Next year, the HSE hopes to have moved them all into community care. Without clear protection, they're still vulnerable. Without a way to find their voice in court, they're sitting ducks.

- Medb Ruane