Seanad report:Rather than delude the families of those who had died in the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings that the truth about those dreadful events could be ascertained, it might be better to look at other ways to help them to bear the cross that they had to carry, Maurice Hayes (Ind) said.
There was an enormous need, he said, to find a way to deal with the hurt of victims, "to sustain them and to help them to find settlement. I don't think you do that by serial inquiries. If there was one person in this country that I would have chosen to find out what happened it would have been Paddy MacEntee, a most able lawyer, a most resolute and a most persistent man. If he can't get at the truth, maybe it's not get-at-able for a lot of reasons."
Dr Hayes said he thought it was unfair to judge a police force of the mid-1970s by the standards which apply nowadays. Things taken for granted now as basic investigative tools, such as DNA and data-processing, had been in their infancy then. "I think it's unfair to castigate today's Garda or even the people at the time because they didn't know what we know now."
Don Lydon (FF) said the disappearance of files relating to "this mass murder" from the Garda and the Department of Justice should be investigated. It might be that, as Dr Hayes had said, the truth about these atrocities was un-get-at-able. "I still think that there are so many people involved that the truth must be get-at-able." He did not think that anyone in the House believed that the disappearance of the files had been an accident. It deserved further investigation until they finally reached the truth.
David Norris (Ind) said they should criticise the Garda and he made no bones about so doing. "The most crucial elements of the investigation were dumped and within such a short time of the then taoiseach, Mr Liam Cosgrave, assuring the public that no stone would be left unturned and that the people that had perpetrated this monstrous act would be brought to justice. Within a couple of months, everything was thrown on a bonfire somewhere. That is not acceptable now, nor was it at that time." He did not accept that they were at the end of the search for the truth.
Jim Walsh (FF) said that following the historic events at Farmleigh last Wednesday it behoved everyone to bring closure to our sad history. That can only be done if the British government comes absolutely clean about its involvement and active participation, through its agents, in some of these terrible events.