Minister showed no urgency in renewing adoption agreement with Vietnam
Issued : Thursday 7 May, 2009
Statement by Joe Costello TD
Minister of State at the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade with responsibility for Trade and Development
Speaking on the Adjournment Debate Joe Costello said that it was an absolute disgrace that the Irish Government had allowed the Bilateral Intercountry Agreement between Ireland and Vietnam to lapse on the 1st May 2009.
The Minister for Children, Barry Andrews, had been warned by supporting NGO’s, prospective adoptive families and members of this House on numerous occasions in recent months that time was running out on renewing the agreement. However, the Minister showed no sense of urgency and took no urgent steps to ensure that a fresh agreement was in place by the 1st May.
In this case the recession had nothing to do with the Minister’s failure. It was plain, old fashioned negligence and laziness. If the Minister had travelled to Vietnam last year undoubtedly everything would have been resolved by now. It wasn’t until the week commencing the 20th April 2009 that the Minister bothered to send an Irish delegation to Vietnam, a week before the expiry date on the 1st May. It was clearly too little too late.
France had no difficulty negotiating a new Bilateral Adoption Agreement with Vietnam, so why should Ireland be different if only the effort had been made?
Now over 1,500 prospective adoptive families who are at various stages of the adoption process are left in the lurch. They do not know when or if a new Agreement will be reached. Their efforts to adopt have been stopped dead at various stages of the process short of the referral stage.
The hundreds of Vietnamese children most of whom are living in orphanages in poor conditions, who had the expectation of a new life in a family environment in Ireland, have had their hopes and perhaps their futures dashed.
The very minimum the Minister should have done was to put in place an interim agreement so that the process could continue pending the negotiation of a new Agreement.
The Minister states the need to ensure that the principles of the Hague Convention are adhered to as a mitigating factor in his defence. It is not. It is simply another reason why he should have acted with alacrity.
In similar fashion there are issues with other countries regarding the Hague principles particularly, the Russian Federation that have yet to be resolved.
It is high time that the Minister fulfilled his responsibilities to all concerned at home and abroad.
