There have been calls for a Government review of the workings of the Residential Institutions Redress Board following the end yesterday of a 22-day hunger strike outside the Dáil by Mr Tom Sweeney (57).
He had been protesting at his treatment by the Redress Board and was seeking a hearing into the abuse he says he suffered as a child during the 1950s and 1960s at Artane, Letterfrack, and Galway.
Ending his strike he said the Government had offered him "a fair and sympathetic hearing" at the High Court. He had accepted the offer, which was all he wanted. Mr Sweeney was then taken to Tallaght Hospital with his son, Mark, who had been on hunger strike with him for 20 days. Both were said to be doing well last night.
Mr Colm O'Gorman of the One in Four group said last night: "It is extraordinary, five years after the Taoiseach's apology [to abuse victims\], that a man has to starve himself practically to death to get a hearing."
The Redress Board had "very serious questions to answer", Mr O'Gorman said. Mr Sweeney's treatment by it, and similar reports by other people who had been before it, suggested they had been "punished, degraded and humiliated", he said.
The Minister for Education and Science, Mr Dempsey, said last night he was very pleased that Mr Sweeney had agreed to end his hunger strike.
The Government had agreed to do everything in its power to expedite the hearing of Mr Sweeney's High Court case "and it accepts that the case should proceed solely on the basis of assessment of damages". He noted "that the integrity of the redress process has been maintained".
On application to the Redress Board Mr Sweeney was made an initial offer of €113,000 compensation. As was his right, he requested a hearing before the board.
This involved turning down the original offer and subjecting himself to assessment for compensation. He was awarded €67,000, raised to €73,000 on appeal.
Mr Sweeney had abandoned a High Court action against the State to pursue the Redress Board route. This action has now been revived following a Government invitation.
It followed a meeting on Wednesday evening between Mr Dempsey and the four TDs from Mr Sweeney's Tallaght constituency - Mr Charlie O'Connor, Mr Pat Rabbitte, Mr Conor Lenihan, and Mr Seán Crowe.
Prior to yesterday's deal Mr Sweeney had been seen by four TDs who are also medical doctors, on an initiative by Mr Charlie O'Connor, who said the doctors concerned, Ceann Comhairle Dr Rory O'Hanlon, Dr Jimmy Devins, Dr Larry Twomey, and Dr Dermot Fitzpatrick, were available in Leinster House yesterday.
The view of all the doctors was that Mr Sweeney was entering a critical and possibly irreversible phase in the hunger strike, where damage to his health was concerned.