Verona Murphy (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am privileged to be here to address you today. As a Member of this House, I am only four years elected. I would have been nine years old when the tragedy happened. I cannot pretend to remember but I have felt everything that has been said through the inquest in the last number of days, as well as every name I have heard and every family that has been remembered, particularly those who are no longer here but also those whose lives changed forever, not just those lost in the Stardust tragedy.

Many of you have fought for 43 years, a fight you did not want to fight. There is no denying you were put through that by the State, but the State is just another name for everybody who enters this House. We are elected representatives and we are elected by the people. This is known as Leinster House. It is otherwise known as the people's House. All too often, we forget who puts us here. For me, it has nothing to do with class, nor should it, but given what you have been through for 43 years and the evidence we have heard, it does appear to have had something to do with class. A life is a life and whether it is 48 young people who died through no fault of their own or many others we have heard of over the decades, the State can and must do better, and that includes me.

I have not had interaction with any of you except for Antoinette Keegan, who wrote to me in 2022 and asked me to make a donation to the Stardust fund. I made a paltry donation and I am ashamed of how paltry it was. All I can say is I have learned more in the past week about how we should serve the people who elect us than over the four years I have been here. I struggle sometimes with what we are elected to do because it is very difficult to make the right decisions.

I sit on the Opposition benches and have huge admiration for the people who have told their story and had the resolve for 43 years. I also have admiration for the Taoiseach. In his short time since being elected, he has reversed the poor decisions that have put you through that for 43 years and has made the decision to admit we were wrong. I am sure it is no consolation but it begins another fight and that fight is to understand whether or not what you have heard today is sincere and will turn out to be true to form. I look forward to a day when we will look back and celebrate what we have learned through the awful tragedy of the Stardust. That will come, no doubt, in the form of a commemoration in which, probably once a year, those in our privileged position will be invited to attend a commemoration ceremony while you live with it every day for the rest of your lives.

I ask the Taoiseach on behalf of those who are left here and those who have put in 43 years of hard fighting and hard slog, lost loved ones, failed on days to keep up the fight but got resolve from somewhere, that we do not put them through it when we decide on what the redress should be. Not only should they be part of it, they should not even be asked to fight for it. Money will not compensate anybody but it is how we decided previously. We have been wrong in this House and have not been listened to. I do not wish to take from anything that might happen or any of what you feel today but we have redress schemes that have left people out. Our most recent did not encompass children under the age of six months who had gone through mother and baby homes. I only in the past week listened to Christine Buckley's interviews. We should be ashamed and should not repeat that mistake.

I do not need to go any further. I have huge admiration for the people who have come here today. I will try to do better as an elected representative.

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