The Tusla Chairman has said the State let down the victims of James O’Reilly.

The 75-year-old from Ballynonty, Thurles in County Tipperary was on Monday jailed for 20 years for the repeated rape and sexual abuse of his seven daughters and his younger sister.

The court heard the victims were also regularly beaten and starved.

The victims have said they were not protected by the State because they were members of the travelling community and there have been calls for an independent investigation to find out why the State failed to intervene.

On Newstalk Breakfast this morning, Tusla Chair Pat Rabbitte said a review of the case should be carried out.

“I think it is self-evident that the State did let down those young women,” he said.

“They have made it very clear on the steps of the court themselves that they didn’t have the education, they were deprived of education, they didn’t know where to go.

“It may be that if there is a review as is proposed by many organisations, and I hope there is, it may be that there is some archived information that will tell us more but it doesn’t appear on the face of it that the State services were involved.

“Now, that is a tragedy. We are never going to achieve perfection in this area but we have to continue to strive to make improvements.”

You can listen back to the interview here: