President Michael D Higgins in Ireland has signed the Mother and Baby Bill into law.
The government won a Dáil (Irish Parliament) vote on the controversial bill by 78 votes to 67 last week.
A presidential statement said concerns raised in the discussion of the bill were “serious and must be considered”.
The legislation relates to records gathered by the Mother and Baby Homes Commission.
Much of the evidence it heard was given in private and legally protected.
A database of 60,000 records is to be transferred to the child and family agency Tusla, while the remaining records will be sealed for 30 years.
But campaigners on behalf of the mothers and their children have expressed fears they will not be able to access their records if they are sealed.
PAT SAYS
This report and bill is very important for many, many thousands of people.
It is the telling of the tragic story of what happened them as children.
And their childhood experiences affected their whole lives.
And it was all shrouded in secrecy- Irish, Catholic secrecy.
It involved nuns, brothers, priests and bishops.
And it involved brainwashed Catholic politicians, judges, lawyers, Garda, medics etc.
The Dark Secrets of Catholic Ireland 1922 to 1970.
That all needs to be brought out into the light.
TODAYS CATHOLIC SECRETS
We still have secret Catholic Ireland.
The current cases of the gay Catholic, seminarians, priests, monks etc is the modern expression of this secret darkness.
Let the light shine into it all!!!!
BISHOP PAT BUCKLEY 