Survivors’ groups were ‘shocked’ to see details of the Mother and Baby Home Commission report leaked to the media over the weekend.

The Minister for Children Roderic O’Gorman has said he was “deeply angered” to see details of the report published on Sunday, two days before its planned release.

He said it was “completely unacceptable” that survivors learned details in the newspaper and pledged to open an investigation into how it happened.

   

On Newstalk Breakfast this morning, Paul Redmond, Chairman of the Coalition of Mother and Baby Home Survivors said members were “very disappointed” with the leak.

“A lot of the survivors were taken aback by it,” he said. “There has been so much communication from the Department lately promising that we would be at the heart of everything and we would be the first to know everything.

“So, it was a shock that some person decided to undercut us like that.”

He said Tuesday was a big day in the calendar for a lot of survivors and it was deflating to see the information leaked.

“Everybody had set themselves up to see the report on Tuesday and had been psyching themselves up for weeks,” he said.

“All of a sudden, it is suddenly just thrown in front of them. It is like somebody ruining a surprise party in a way. I know that is a bad analogy but it was just such a shock to a lot of people.”

Death rate

It is believed the report will note that around 9,000 children and babies died in 18 homes between 1922 and 1998 – double the mortality rate of children in general society.

Mr Redmond said the finding is no surprise to survivors.

“That is a shocking finding by the tribunal but at the same time, the community are certainly not shocked by that,” he said.

“We have previously put out estimates that around 7,000 or 8,000 children and babies died in the Mother and Baby homes and the rest would have died in the four county homes that were analysed.”

He said some of the country’s homes had far higher death rates than others.

“It is double the mortality rate over all yes but at the same time, there were times that it has been confirmed that the infant mortality rate in places like Bessborough occasionally ran to over ten times the mortality rate.”

Previous research by adoption campaigners has found a death rate of 50% and above at the County Cork home – and was higher in some years.

State apology

The Taoiseach Micheál Martin is expected to make a full State apology to survivors in the Dáil this week.

Mr Redmond said the Taoiseach must understand what survivors went through in making the apology.

“I would like a genuine, from the heart, apology from the State because the State was ultimately responsible for all of us that were born in mother and baby homes and what happened to us for the rest of our lives,” he said.

“So, I would like the Taoiseach to be keenly aware – it is not just about our cribmates who died, it is also about the living survivors and the lives we have had.

“In most cases they were lives filled with questions that were never answered and still have not been answered so I would like him to be very aware of that.”

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