Health chiefs are to be investigated over the handling of clerical abuse allegations in the Catholic Church, it emerged tonight.
Children's Ombudsman Emily Logan said her office will probe if there has been any maladministration by the Health Service Executive (HSE) and Department of Health when it carried out an audit on child protection issues in Dioceses across the country, including Cork's scandal-hit Diocese of Cloyne.
The beleaguered Bishop of Cloyne John Magee, a former Vatican aide, has faced down repeated calls to resign over his handling of child sex abuse allegations.
Although the HSE audit found Cloyne breached church and state guidelines as it did not inform health chiefs of complaints made against two of its priests, it stated it did not need further investigation.
But Children's Minister Barry Andrews stepped in and demanded a re-examination of all complaints in the south-west.
The Government ordered a state inquiry into alleged paedophile clerics in the Archdiocese of Dublin to extend its two-year long probe to include allegations made in Cloyne.
Ms Logan has now written to the HSE and the Department of Health requesting files relating to the audit.
Although the Ombudsman's office holds a certain moral authority, there is nothing laid down in law giving the office powers to force organisations and people to act.
The HSE said it would cooperate fully with the investigation.
"The HSE has undertaken significant work in this area since 2005 in close association with the Department of Health and Children and is more than happy to make all information, resources and facilities available in
order to expedite this important work of the Office of the Ombudsman for Children," it said in a statement.
However, Fine Gael's spokesman on children, Alan Shatter, questioned the need for the investigation
"Whilst the Ombudsman's announcement of today is interesting, it is action from the Minister and the Government that is required and I am concerned that the Ombudsman's actions may be used as an excuse by Government to do nothing," he said.
"It is noteworthy that last Autumn the Ombudsman announced that she was conducting an investigation into whether the HSE was properly implementing the Children First: Child Protection Guidelines 1999 some three months after the publication of a detailed report commissioned by the Department for Children had confirmed that the Guidelines were not being complied with and that our child care services were chaotic.
"A serious question arises as to whether it is in the public interest that the Ombudsman for Children re-investigate issues on which a comprehensive report has already been published or conduct an investigation into Ministerial and Departmental failures that are readily apparent and incontrovertible."
Children's charity Barnardos welcomed the move and said it hoped serious issues raised by child protection practices can be addressed and learnt from.
"We were disappointed that the HSE audit failed to glean any real insight into the operation of child protection practices across the Dioceses," said Cchief executive Fergus Finlay.
"In particular, the failure to appreciate the significance of misleading and untrue information supplied by the Diocese of Cloyne has to throw a major question mark over the quality of the audit.
"Overall the report failed to capitalise on the opportunity to glean vital information about how child protection systems work on the ground."
The HSE was called in to investigate child protection procedures in every Diocese around the country on foot of the recommendations of the 2005 Ferns Report, which highlighted 100 allegations of child sex abuse made against 21 priests in Co Wexford between 1962 and 2002.
While it cleared all parishes, its investigation agreed with a damning report by a church abuse watchdog that found Cloyne did not adhere to either church or state guidelines as health chiefs were never notified of the complaints.
The National Board for Safeguarding Children (NBSC) last month found Bishop Magee took minimal action over a series of child abuse allegations against two of his priests and that, what little action he took, was inappropriately delayed.
The first allegation, against Father A, was made by a priest in December 2004 who claimed he had been abused by another priest when he was a young boy.
Several complaints were also made against a second priest, Father B, who was accused of molesting two teenage girls over a five year period, abusing a 14-year-old boy and of having a year-long sexual relationship with the boy's mother.
Bishop Magee has apologised to victims of clerical abuse and pledged to co-operate fully with the Commission of Investigation into the Dublin Archdiocese, which was due to complete its investigation of child abuse in the capital's parishes over the last 30 years at the end of this month.
The aims of the latest Children's Ombudsman investigation are to establish if an action by the Department of Health and Children and/or the HSE in relation to the handling of the audit has or may have adversely affected a child, or if there has been any maladministration on their part.
PA