Woman carried sack of potatoes on her back to end pregnancy, Dáil told

Cork South West Fine Gael TD Jim Daly said he was "haunted" by the story of a woman who had carried a sack of potatoes on her back in an attempt to end an unplanned pregnancy.

He said a friend of his father had related how, as a young boy, he and other locals had observed the woman with a heavy sack of potatoes walking around in circles in the yard of her home for days on end.

“It was only in later years that they learned that this poor unfortunate young woman was pregnant and this was her attempt to rid herself of what she considered to be the cancer in her body,’’ Mr Daly added.

“That is how society taught that young woman and her extended family to react to probably one of the greatest and most exciting and brilliant times in people’s lives, when they discover they are pregnant and will create a life.”

He said the woman, who later entered a home, did not live in a society which was accepting of a young woman being pregnant outside of wedlock. Fear was the dominant and prevailing emotion that she and her extended family experienced at the time, he added.

Mr Daly was speaking during the debate on a motion on the setting up of a statutory inquiry into the operation of mother-and-baby homes.

Minister for Children and Youth Affairs Dr James Reilly said setting up the commission, with all the necessary powers to get the required information, would mean society coming to a greater understanding of how it failed in the treatment of vulnerable single women and children.

Dr Reilly recalled that he had taken over as Minister last July, shortly after a motion had been passed by the Dáil on the need to establish the facts regarding the deaths of children at the Bon Secours mother-and-baby home in Tuam, Co Galway.

“For those who gave me individual accounts of their experiences, I found them compelling and greatly appreciate the willingness and courage of those who shared their personal and often harrowing experiences with me.”

He said other advocacy groups, public bodies and political colleagues across the spectrum had also provided him with a wide range of views.

Fianna Fáil spokesman Robert Troy said a positive outcome of the story of mass graves at the Tuam mother-and-baby home was that it proved to be a catalyst for the establishment of a commission of investigation.

“We have heard stories of many barbaric practices visited upon women solely and exclusively because they had children out of wedlock,” he said. “We have heard stories from this era of children who, because they were born to unmarried mothers, were treated like chattels rather than human beings.”

Sinn Féin spokesman Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin said the survivors of these homes and similar institutions, who were in the visitors’ gallery, represented not only themselves and each other but thousands of the most poorly treated of Irish citizens.

Their life experiences, he added, exposed now as never before, “stand out to the eternal shame of the State and all who contributed to its practices towards the treatment of single mothers and their children”.

Independent TD Catherine Murphy said the terms of reference covered 1922-1998. Some institutions existed before the State’s foundation, but nothing was done to reform them and inequality was reinforced.

"The church was trusted as though it was an arm of the State, even though it was known incredible cruelty was taking place," Ms Murphy added. "The State had no entitlement to do that."