The Minister of Health has said she will establish a public inquiry into the retention of human organs without consent.
Speaking to the Assembly, Ms Bairbre de Brun (Sinn Fein) said investigations undertaken by her Department indicated that since 1970 376 children's organs had been retained and held without parental consent, 361 at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast and 15 at Altnagelvin Hospital in Derry. Sixty adult organs had also been retained, mostly without consent, she said.
In response to these findings, Ms de Brun announced a number of measures, the most significant being the establishment of a statutorily-based public inquiry.
The Minister said the inquiry would have the power to summon witnesses and require information should this be necessary.
It would have the right to hold sittings in public and was expected to report within 12 months. Ms de Brun said her Department planned the speedy establishment of a relatives' support group. This group would bring together parents, health councils, hospitals and bereavement counsellors.
Responding to questioning from the Rev Bob Coulter of the UUP, the Minister said that only in comparatively few cases had organs been returned to relatives and added that facilitating this would be one of the tasks of the support group.
She said she intended to review the Human Tissues Act with the aim of making it a criminal offence to retain organs without consent.
Ms de Brun said she was "clear that absolutely no organs should be retained by the health service without the explicit and informed consent of the family of the deceased. This is absolutely essential".
As it would take some time for new laws to be enacted, Ms de Brun said, it was also her intention to introduce guidelines as an interim measure.
Mrs Iris Robinson (DUP) accused the Minister of mounting an insufficient investigation into the issue and said she had adopted a "drip-feed" approach which was eroding public confidence in the donor system.
Ms de Brun rejected the accusation, saying her officials had taken immediate steps to investigate what had been happening.
During a debate on the treatment of asylum-seekers in Northern Ireland, the Assembly heard that some were being housed alongside prisoners in Northern jails.
Moving a motion supporting a report which called for an end to the practice, Mr Conor Murphy of Sinn Fein said: "Asylum-seekers are not to blame for a recurrent housing crisis, successive governments are. Asylum-seekers are not to blame for low social welfare, successive governments are. Asylum-seekers are not to blame for delays in processing applications, successive governments are".
Mrs Robinson said that as the republican movement had made hundreds of people homeless, for Sinn Fein to put forward such a motion was "either a joke or hypocrisy".
Mr Roy Beggs of the UUP said he agreed with much of the motion, but because it originated from Sinn Fein, he could not vote for it.
The motion was passed.