The Conference of Religious of Ireland (CORI) agreed at its annual general meeting in Rosslare yesterday to support proposals by the Irish Bishops Conference for a church-wide audit of how complaints of clerical child sex abuse have been handled over recent decades.
The audit will include religious congregations affiliated to CORI and the Irish Missionary. Details will be announced at a joint press conference hosted in Dublin by the three groups, probably towards the middle of next week.
Last night CORI secretary general Sister Elizabeth Maxwell said: "It is our desire that this process will advance, in a transparent and caring fashion, further healing and forgiveness. We are committed to learning from the mistakes and failings of the past so that we can work towards the establishment of structures and practices which will safeguard the welfare of children."
Meanwhile Labour TD Ms Róisín Shortall has said taxpayers had been "ripped off" by the deal agreed between the religious orders and the State where compensation for victims of institutional abuse was concerned.
In a question during the adjournment debate in the Dáil last night, she said: "The deal will result in a huge bill for taxpayers, a bill that could eventually reach €1 billion. The religious orders, whose members are guilty of the abuse, will only contribute a paltry sum to the compensation fund."
In theory they would pay €127 million - "about a quarter of the estimated cost of the compensation awards", she said, while "the actual cash amount that will be handed over to the State will be relatively small".
She also strongly objected to the indemnity granted by the State to the religious orders where future court actions relating to abuse up to June 5th this year were concerned. In a written reply to her question, the Government said the scheme to compensate victims of institutional abuse was set up without regard to whether the religious would be involved.
It was done against a background of more than 1,000 cases pending in the High Court against both the State and various congregations.
The religious then came on board saying they wished to make a meaningful contribution to the scheme. After long negotiations they agreed to pay €128 million in "cash, counselling costs and real property". The indemnity applied only to cases eligible under the scheme and would apply in "relatively few cases".
It was "misleading" to say the deal with the religious had implications for the taxpayer. What implications there were "arose from the fact children were incarcerated in institutions by public bodies for decades and suffered injury, often serious injury, as a result".
