The High Court has permitted the Health Service Executive to publish a redacted report into its handling of a family’s child-care case, concluding that publication was justified by public interest and accountability, provided the children were protected from further harm.
In an extempore judgment delivered on 27 October 2010, Mr Justice John MacMenamin said the court had heard the HSE’s application on notice on 22 and 26 October. The parents, identified in the proceedings only as A. and B., had been convicted of offences including assaults on their children. The judgment records that the mother received a seven-year prison sentence and the father a 14-year sentence, with the final 18 months suspended.
The HSE had commissioned a non-statutory inquiry after public concern about the children’s welfare and questions about why they were not taken into care until 2004, despite earlier involvement by the HSE and its predecessor, the Western Health Board. The HSE sought permission to publish the inquiry team’s final draft, prepared by 21 July 2010. The court stressed it had no input into the report and that permission to publish did not endorse its contents or conclusions.
The judge met the children at the request of their guardian ad litem. They expressed fear that publication and sensationalised coverage would make them relive painful experiences. Two remained firmly opposed to publication. The judge said their views deserved equal respect and that the children’s welfare remained paramount.
He nevertheless found, on balance, that publication should proceed. The report concerned the HSE’s interaction with the family, was commissioned as part of the Executive’s statutory child-care functions, and raised a matter of broad public interest. Some of the children hoped it could help prevent similar events elsewhere. The judgment also cited the public-accountability question and the risk that withholding a report already known to exist could be misrepresented as a cover-up.
The court granted the permissive order, which allowed the steps needed to publish the report. It also imposed restrictions to protect the children: media publication of information that could identify them, alone or combined with other information, was restrained, and media representatives were prohibited from approaching them directly or indirectly. The judgment said the initials used in the case title were assigned by the court and were not the children’s real names. The matter remained under court supervision, with liberty to apply at short notice if necessary.