By Bruce Arnold
Thursday May 21 2009
THE five-volume Report of the Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse is a vast document. It attempts to cover six of the ten 10 years since Bertie Ahern made his public apology to those who had suffered abuse in the industrial schools and, together with Judge Mary Laffoy’s Third Interim Report, published in December 2003, it completes the record of the commission’s work.
It is inevitably flawed with omissions and misconception evident on a first reading and with cursory attention to matters of historic importance. Much of this will come to light as the extensive document is more fully analysed. At this stage it is worth identifying the inexcusable examples.
One of these concerns the Kennedy Report. Published in 1970 and chaired by Miss Justice Kennedy, president of the District Court, the report failed to tackle any of the key problems in the industrial school system and excluded from consideration the most serious problem faced by the children — corporal punishment.
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