A DECISION on whether mandatory reporting of abuse will be introduced in Ireland will be made by the end of the year, the Minister of State with responsibility for child care, Mr Austin Currie, pledged yesterday.
Mr Currie said it was a "very complex" issue. This was underlined by the 200 responses which he had received to the discussion paper published on the issue last April. These included submissions from professionals, child care agencies and gardai.
Mr Currie said "all options are open" and would be discussed at the special all day meeting he had convened in Dublin for September 16th. All those who submitted responses have been invited.
He was speaking following a debate at the conference on whether mandatory reporting helps to protect children. Dr Kevin Browne, chairing, said it was "a very important debate for Ireland".
Ms Patricia Toth, an American prosecutor and former director of the National Centre for Prosecution of Child Abuse, said silence and secrecy were the enemy of children being abused, and mandatory reporting meant more children would come to the attention of the authorities.
She said there had been 3.1 million reports of suspected abuse of children in the US in 1995, a 50 per cent increase since 1990. Half of those came from professionals who were mandated to report them.
She said many people had problems with the response to mandatory reporting and the response had to be "sensitive, prompt, skilful and comprehensive". Clear standards had to be set and followed through.
"The entire community bears responsibility for raising a child and mandatory reporting recognises that responsibility and codifies it," said Ms Toth. There had been few US prosecutions of professionals failing to report suspected cases of abuse, she added.
Dr Catherine Marneffe, from Belgium, who opposed mandatory reporting, said it gave the impression of the state taking care of the child, but the reality was the services were not there to meet the demand created by mandatory reporting.
Dr Marneffe, a family therapist, said families must be offered confidentiality, respect and solidarity to encourage them to seek help. "There is no place for mandatory reporting if abusive parents are expected to trust professionals," she said.
In Belgium, she said, confidential treatment centres had been set up. In 1992 6,550 cases had been reported voluntarily. Just 167 of these cases had to be passed on to the legal authorities.
Before the centres were set up, she said, only 2 per cent of cases had been reported by parents. Now that figure had risen to 30 per cent.
Dr Marneffe said the "terrible crime" which had taken place in Belgium was exceptional and might lead to some people calling for mandatory reporting there. "But laws and social policy cannot be based on exceptional cases of brutality."