THE Adoption Board was told over a year ago that adoptees had been receiving misleading information from St Patrick's Guild, it was alleged yesterday.
The board has refused to say whether it received complaints about the guild or what it did about them.
Meanwhile, the Adopted and Fostered Persons' Association of Ireland (AFPAI), has called for the establishment of a new body to collect and store adoption and fostering files and to help people separated by adoption or fostering to contact each other.
Calls have been made on the Government, and particularly on the Minister of State for Health, Mr Austin Currie, to bring forward new adoption legislation immediately.
Mr Antoin Sweeney of Adoption Action, which preceded AFPAI, says he was present at a meeting with the Adoption Board more than a year ago at which the board was told adoptees were concerned that they had been given misleading information by St Patrick's Guild.
Asked if it had received complaints about the guild and what it had done about them, the Adoption Board said yesterday that "the board from time to time receives queries in relation to the practices of agencies.
"Each case is dealt with on an individual basis. It is not the practice of the board to comment publicly on any such case.
AFPAI called for the establishment of a "Post-Adoption and Fostering Services Board" to help fostered or adopted people to obtain information about their origin and to facilitate contact between them.
It should be appointed by the Government and be chaired by a senior member of the legal profession, it said.
Senator Marian McGennis, who is an adoptee, called on the Government to bring legislation to the Oireachtas straight away to provide a framework for access to information and contact.
She was tired, she said, of hearing promises that legislation would be brought forward without anything happening.
If there were worries about the constitutionality of a Bill it could be referred to the Supreme Court by the President.
Ms Norah Gibbons of Barnardos also called for legislation to be brought to the Oireachtas allowing adoptees to have the right to their original birth certificates from the age of 18.
It should stipulate that people receive counselling before getting their birth certificates and that they should be free to choose a registered counsellor not employed by the adoption society.