Ministers disagree on how indemnity deal was done

The Minister for Justice, Mr McDowell, has clashed publicly with his former Cabinet colleague, Dr Michael Woods, over the controversial compensation deal between the Government and Catholic religious orders for abuse victims.

Mr McDowell yesterday accused Dr Woods of excluding him "unilaterally" from negotiations on the deal in 2001, when Mr McDowell was attorney general and Dr Woods was education minister.

He bluntly rejected an assertion by Dr Woods that he, Mr McDowell, had been involved in the negotiation process "at an appropriate level.

"If you're asking me whether the Attorney General's Office was involved to an appropriate level at all times, the answer is that I have to candidly disagree with the former minister," he told reporters yesterday.

Mr McDowell said that in October 2001, an impasse arose in the negotiations between the State and the Conference of Religious of Ireland (CORI) over the redress scheme for children abused in religious-run institutions.

As a result, Dr Woods decided unilaterally that he and the secretary general of his department alone should meet CORI in future negotiations.

The attorney general and his staff were excluded from two meetings which took place in November 2001 and January 2002.

"I do not believe that was a wise decision at the time," Mr McDowell commented.

He reported his "unhappiness that important decisions were being made without adequate legal input" at a meeting he arranged with Dr Woods and the Taoiseach.

Mr McDowell then wrote to Dr Woods in January 2002 to request full notes of all meetings so his officials could take legal advice on their "full import" in the event of any deal being struck.

"It was a cause of some regret to me that no such documentation was apparently in existence at the time."

In March 2002, a retrospective memorandum was drawn up to inform the Attorney General's Office of what happened, he said. Mr McDowell added he was not in a position to say whether the deal arrived at by Dr Woods was a good one or a bad one because he was not present at the negotiations.

As attorney general, he was there in a non-political capacity. It would have been wrong for him to approach the matter from a party political point of view.

"The advice I gave was 100 per cent and the involvement of my office, to the extent that it was permitted, was appropriate."

As for the Comptroller and Auditor General's estimate that the State's potential liability from the redress scheme could reach €1 billion, Mr McDowell said this was a "worst-case estimate".

He estimated the eventual liability to be at €300 million-€500 million.

Mr McDowell said the merits of the deal eventually arrived at with CORI had not been fully explained. Under Irish law, an abuse victim would have been entitled to sue both the State and the religious orders.

The State had decided to pay compensation without the need for full court proof. Having set the bar low enough for people to claim compensation without full legal proof, it had "thrown away" its right to claim "as of legal right" any contribution from the religious orders.