Attorney General Rory Brady is to advise the Government on whether the State should pay legal costs incurred by Ferns diocese in its dealings with the Ferns inquiry.
Figures issued by the Department of Health yesterday, in response to a query from The Irish Times, disclosed that the total cost of the inquiry was €1.94 million. The figure includes €792,000 for rent, staff costs, office machinery, IT and other costs, and €925,000 was in legal fees for the inquiry team's solicitors and senior counsel.
An unsworn inquiry held in private, the Ferns inquiry was set up by the Government to investigate the handling by the diocese, the local health authorities and the Garda of clerical child sex abuse allegations.
It has since been reported that the diocese has sought €100,000 from the inquiry to cover legal fees it incurred in dealing with the inquiry. A spokesman for the diocese would neither confirm nor deny this.
However, a Department of Health spokeswoman said yesterday that claims for costs had been lodged by the diocese and one individual. No one else had sought costs.
She said no decision had been made by the Government, but the advice of the Attorney General was being sought in relation to the issue of costs.
The Ferns Report, published on October 25th, was a damning indictment of the handling of clerical child sex abuse allegations by diocesan authorities there.
An appendix to the report disclosed that "due to a regrettable error", files relating to allegations involving 10 Ferns priests only came to the inquiry's attention this summer and too late in five cases for them to be fully investigated.
Meanwhile in Dublin, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin has asked priests there to begin a programme of consultation with lay parishioners as to how the archdiocese can improve child protection structures.
In a letter to priests he said: "We must now take all the steps needed to learn the hard lessons which come from a more considered reading of the Ferns report. People want not just to hear words of regret but to see concrete actions being taken regarding the protection of children in the future."
He asked the priests to convene special meetings of parish pastoral councils this month to study the recommendations in the report and propose concrete ideas as to how the archdiocese could provide better protection for children.
Lay people, through parish councils, are asked to suggest further structures to ensure best possible practice in child protection.
The archbishop proposed similar meetings with the boards of management of Dublin schools.
"People want and deserve to see concrete action. We have an obligation to take that action and to demonstrate how much the diocese at every level values the protection of children," he said.