THE STATE yesterday appealed to the Supreme Court against a High Court decision granting a female abuse victim a declaration that the 2002 law restricting redress for abuse in residential institutions to children under 18 is unconstitutional.
The victim had just turned 18 days after she was admitted to a mother and baby home in 1968 after becoming pregnant, allegedly by an older brother. She claimed she was then abused at the home but was refused redress on grounds of age while her younger sister, who was admitted to the home on the same day – also allegedly pregnant by her brother – secured redress.
Last October, Mr Justice Iarfhlaith O’Neill declared the relevant provisions of the Residential Institutions Redress Act 2002 unconstitutional and “unjustifiable discrimination” on grounds of age, as the abuse occurred when persons under 21 were regarded in law as children. His decision means persons abused in residential institutions up to the age of 21 will be entitled to seek redress.
Opening the State’s appeal against the decision yesterday, Maurice Collins SC, for the State, said the decision “strikes at the very heart of the entrenched constitutional doctrine of the separation of powers”.
The effect of the declaration was to do what the courts, particularly the Supreme Court, have repeatedly counselled against – to substitute a judicial judgment for the judgment of the legislature on a matter “firmly within” the province of the legislature, he said.
The High Court order effectively substituted an alternative redress scheme without adverting to the potential financial consequences, counsel argued. Because of the requirement to have regard to the State’s resources, the Oireachtas was entitled to draw a line beyond which claims could not be brought. Mr Collins will continue his arguments before the five-judge Supreme Court today.
The challenge to the provisions of the 2002 Act was brought by a woman admitted to St Patrick’s Mother and Baby Home on the Navan Road, Dublin, in 1968 after becoming pregnant allegedly by an older brother.
She suffered abuse at the home, but was not entitled to redress as she was over 18 at the time of the abuse. Her baby was placed for adoption.
Her younger sister, also pregnant allegedly by an older brother, was admitted to the same home and did secure redress for abuse suffered there. Both girls alleged they were abused in the family home over 10 or 11 years by their two older brothers.
Mr Justice O’Neill said the State’s “understandable desire” to clearly limit the extent of the redress scheme by introducing an age limit could not justify excluding from the scheme persons who enjoyed, in law, the status of children during the time they were resident in an residential institution.
