Legal clash at vaccine inquiry

There were angry outbursts over legal representation at the first public session of the vaccine trials inquiry in Dublin yesterday.

Individuals from support groups for victims of abuse spoke vehemently from the public gallery. They are seeking separate representation by their own legal teams for each group at the inquiry.

Ms Justice Mary Laffoy, chairwoman of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse, stressed however that the inquiry was at the "very, very preliminary stage" and "there is no case at this juncture for making an order for legal representation".

The row broke out after Cork solicitor Mr Eugene Murphy, who sought legal representation, objected to the establishment of a neutral independent legal team to represent the interests of all those who might potentially be affected by the vaccinations.

Mr Michael O'Brien, chairman of the Right to Peace group in Clonmel, said victims of abuse could not trust the State to represent them and they were "tired of being muzzled".

Mrs Christine Buckley of Aislinn, a support group for victims of abuse, said "the legal representatives were not in care. We were."

The inquiry will investigate three vaccine trials undertaken on up to 300 children in residential institutions in the 1960s and 1970s and it will also inquire into assertions that children may have been involved in other unidentified trials. If such trials occurred they will then be included in the inquiry, Ms Justice Laffoy said.

The commission's leading senior counsel Mr Frank Clarke said the inquiry's team, with two inquiry officers, would pursue all inquiries in relation to the three known trials and attempt to find out if there were other trials.

At present there was "no apparent difference of interests between affected parties". He explained that an independent legal team, a neutral body to represent the interest of those who were affected or potentially affected by the vaccine trials, would be established. The legal team would have full access to all the institutions and it would retain its own experts who could give evidence at the inquiry if necessary.

Mr Murphy, who represents a number of people who may have been vaccinated, said he was surprised he would have to hand over to a new legal team which would be "breaching confidentiality of highly sensitive" information from his clients.

"They deserve to be represented by the people they put their trust in," he said to applause from the public gallery.

Mr O'Brien, who spent eight years in an institution, said "we were pin cushions for every doctor who came into the place". "They tell us the State will decide who represents us. We don't trust the State and we never have."

Mr Clarke said he did not believe it was appropriate to have a multiplicity of legal representation for people of similar interests.

No date has been set for the start of formal hearings, until preliminary inquiries are completed.