The release of records related to burials at the Bessborough mother and baby home moved a step closer on Tuesday.
Minister for Children Norma Foley has secured Government approval to make a High Court application to unseal technical archaeological reports at the former institution. The application will be made to search for and publish technical documents related to burials at the site.
Campaigners trying to stop the building of an apartment development at the Cork city site have welcomed the news. The burial places of more than 800 children and 19 women who spent time in the institution remain unknown.
In a written update provided to survivors and advocates on Tuesday, Foley said: “No evidence or document given to the Commission of Investigation into Mother and Baby Homes can be published by the minister or any other party, unless otherwise directed by a court.”
Foley said she sought Cabinet support to make a High Court application because of the “importance and sensitivity of the issue ... to so many families, and to help support transparency”.
The release of witness evidence given to the commission will not be sought as part of the application.
Patricia Carey, special advocate for survivors of institutional abuse, welcomed the fact Cabinet approval has been granted.
Carey said the commission of investigation into mother and baby institutions “was veiled in secrecy” and the sealing of records was “an affront to an open and transparent response to burial grounds and survivors’ concerns”.
“I have repeatedly called for the opening of records to ensure survivors can have access to their records and to identify burial grounds of all those who died in institutions,” she said.
A motion calling on the Government to release unpublished technical archaeological reports concerning burials at the former institution was passed unanimously by Cork City Council last month. The motion also called on the Government to direct the Attorney General to open an inquest into deaths at the institution “as a matter of moral urgency”.
Labour Party councillor Peter Horgan, who proposed the motion, on Tuesday said he was “glad that the Government is listening to Cork City Council and survivors”.
He called on the High Court to “prioritise” the application once it receives it, given the “emotional toll this has had on people”.
“I hope that the court would move swiftly in unlocking these details, so that all survivors can have a look at the information in the full light of day.”
Carmel Cantwell from the Bessborough Mother and Baby Home Support Group also welcomed the news, saying the potential release of any extra information “is welcome from our point of view”.
“We’re going in the right direction ... It’s about finding out the truth,” she said.
Cantwell’s brother William died in December 1960, when he was six weeks old, in St Finbarr’s Hospital in Cork after being transferred there from Bessborough. She has not been able to find out where he is buried.
Cantwell is among the defendants taking a judicial review aimed at overturning the planning permission granted in July.
In her update, Foley noted that details of the findings of the records in question were included in the commission’s final report in 2021.
“The documents include high resolution Air Corps photographs of Bessborough from 1951; site survey documentation; and the Commission’s cartographic and landscape assessments of possible unrecorded burial sites, carried out by forensic archaeologists,” the statement said.
“Witness evidence falls outside the scope of materials which are proposed to be searched for under this proposal, as evidence was given in private session by witnesses at the Commission on their understanding that their confidentiality and privacy would be respected and upheld at all times.”
In February, developer Estuary View Enterprises was granted planning permission by Cork City Council to build 140 apartments at the site. Horgan and the Bessborough Mother and Baby Home Support Group lodged appeals with An Coimisiún Pleanála (ACP), which in July upheld permission for 106 apartments.
In its ruling, ACP said there was no evidence of unrecorded burials in the area where the development was proposed. Conditions attached to the permission include forensic archaeological monitoring during construction works and the appointment of a liaison officer to engage with survivor groups.
More than 900 children died at Bessborough or in hospital after being transferred from the institution, which operated from 1922 to 1998.
Despite “very extensive inquiries and searches”, the commission of investigation was able only to establish the burial places of 64 children, meaning the burial places of more than 800 children remain unknown.
The inquiry concluded it was likely some of them were buried in unmarked graves but did not consider it feasible to excavate the full site, which amounts to 24 hectares. The entire estate covers about 80 hectares, parts of which have already been built on.