UNIVERSITY COLLEGE DUBLIN
HONORARY CONFERRING
Thursday, 5 December 2013 at 10.30 a.m.
TEXT OF THE INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS DELIVERED BY PROFESSOR IMELDA MAHER, UCD School of Law, University College Dublin on 5 December 2013, on the occasion of the conferring of the Degree of Doctor of Laws, honoris causa on Yvonne Murphy
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President, Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen.
Yvonne Murphy, retired circuit court judge and author of the transformative and historic Murphy Reports on the Dublin and Cloyne Roman Catholic Dioceses was a UCD student at three different times in her life. She studied law here as a mature student, while also working full time at the Revenue Commissioners. She later secured a graduate diploma in social science and subsequently a Masters in Business Studies. The range of disciplines reflected in her student life: law, social science and business, point to a range and depth of experience also seen in her professional life.
She trained as a barrister but before commencing a career at the Irish Bar she worked briefly as an air hostess, then an information officer and later head of information at the National Social Service Board. She was a news journalist in RTE before being appointed as a special adviser to the then Tánaiste, Michael O’Leary. After working as an editor of the specialist journal, Industrial Relations News, she entered the Law Library in the mid-80s. A founding co-editor of the Irish Times Law Reports she is co-author of Journalists and the Law now in its third edition, and of Insider Dealing
She was called to both the English Bar and the Northern Irish Bar. She was vice-chair of the Employment Appeals Tribunal and the Employment Equality Agency. She also acted as chair of the law clerks joint labour committee.
She was appointed to the Circuit Court Bench in the late 90s where she sat predominantly as a criminal trial judge while also hearing cases in Family Law in the civil court.
She is a member of the Board of Management of the Bridge Project – a community-based programme for young adult persistent offenders in the Dublin area that provides an alternative to prison. This position reflects her interest in social justice and suggests compassion, a quality needed when she was appointed chair of the Commission of Investigation into the Dublin Diocese in 2006, and later to the Cloyne diocese in Cork. The Reports involved reporting on allegations or suspicions of child abuse by clerics in the diocese and the reaction to allegations by the Health Authorities and the Gardaí.
The 3 volume Dublin report eventually published in Nov 2009 is a truly historic landmark for the state. It has proven a defining moment in the relationship between the state and the Roman Catholic Church. It deserves the epithet historic because of the way the report is crafted and the impact it has had. Judge Murphy uses plain, unambiguous language that is accessible, direct, without compromise or obfuscation. A report accessible to all, should one be strong enough to read the tragedies and scandal of failure to our children contained therein.
Because of the clarity of the report and the dignity, compassion and clear-headedness of the chair of the Commission, Judge Murphy, it provoked serious, considered reaction from government, and was one of the factors contributing to the passing of the children referendum in 2012, a lasting legacy to the work of the Commission.
Judge Murphy’s work is not done. Two weeks ago she was appointed by the Government to assist in finding closure for women who have been affected by a symphysiotomy procedure with a view to proposing a just outcome.
Judge Murphy we honour you today as an exemplary role model for our graduates, someone who epitomises the need for lawyers to call to account, to remind the state and private bodies of their responsibilities to us and the need to give effect to the constitutional guarantee in A40.3.1 of the constitution that says
The State guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate the personal rights of the citizen.
Where the state fails to honour that guarantee today we are reminded that there are those like you, who, through their clear vision and when given the opportunity, can reveal the extent of those failures so the constitution, and the values within it, can once again have meaning.
Praehonorabilis Praeses, totaque Universitas,
Praesento vobis hanc meam filiam, quam scio tam moribus quam doctrina habilem et idoneum esse qui admittatur, honoris causa, ad gradum Doctoratus utroque Jure, tam Civili quam Canonico; idque tibi fide mea testor ac spondeo, totique Academiae.