Due to our recent history, when faced with economic facts we seem to run away with our fingers in our ears going, ‘I don’t hear you’. A new housing boom on the horizon? Stuff your economic data, we’re gonna party like it’s 2005.

Back in the day when I used to hang around the corridors of power trying to convince politicians about disability rights, I was pretty direct in saying, ‘Listen, this will have up front costs but it will save you in the long run.’

When the Public Accounts Committee was interrogating certain charities about how they spent STATE funds with very little returns, my heart skipped a bit lighter.

Having any form of disability adds costs to any person. Even if you are not on welfare and are in employment, there will be hidden costs. You may tire easily so the extra taxi here and there will add up. This is a fact. I’m not looking for sympathy or special treatment. It is just a fact.

The ESRI has done the state some service today. We are all too aware of the psychological and physical damage caused by Child Sexual Abuse. We forget that many of the consequences of abuse can be called disabilities. The ESRI have laid bare the economic repercussions of abuse. They found:

• Looking at people aged 50 to 64, 17 per cent of male and 14 percent of female survivors of CSA were out of the labour force as a result of being sick or permanently disabled. (The corresponding figures for those who had not experienced CSA were 8 and 6 per cent respectively.)
• Controlling for factors such as age and education, the gap between male survivors of CSA and other men is even greater, with CSA survivors being three times more likely to be sick or disabled.
• After controlling for factors like age and education, it is estimated that male survivors of CSA live in households where the income is 34 per cent lower.
• Male survivors of CSA are twice as likely to be living alone compared to other men.

Not only have they had their childhood robbed from them, their future it seems had been taken out of their hands. The possibility of being a productive adult living a full live was and is diminished beyond belief.
Shocking and sobering.

To those who try to hide abuse: these findings show you how wrong you were and are.
My mind shifts north to Armagh. One of my first Undaunted pieces was an open letter to Cardinal Brady. You can read it here.

It is ironic that the ESRI report comes out a day before the Cardinal’s 75th birthday. The day he can ask the Pope to resign. He has told us he sent his application to Rome last month. He was following canon law.

Am I being too cruel to suggest the ESRI report might make a good piece of retirement reading? Victims of clerical abuse might hope so. We should all read the report. It reminds us to cherish childhood and protect it as best we can