Heritage Sites
Dail Éireann — 2026-06-16
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Neale Richmond (FG), Dublin Rathdown

I completely understand the frustration and indeed anger of the Deputies and I do not contest it in any way. As a young history undergraduate student, I spent hours and hours - not quite 700 hours - in the gaol itself carrying out my own primary research and it was invaluable. I have a well-thumbed copy of Ghosts of Kilmainham . It was not actually mine originally; it was my sister’s. She also studied history, albeit she was smarter than me and got into Trinity College.
Regarding the points made by the Deputies, while there are no plans to proceed with an OPW-sponsored relaunch event, the importance of the publication and the historical record contained in it is fully acknowledged. The publication continues and will continue to be available and remains an important account of the restoration story of Kilmainham Gaol.
We are not going to resolve this situation this evening. I do not believe the Deputies expect me to resolve it. Unfortunately, I am just in the firing line of their ire. That is the lot I have drawn this evening. However, I will write to the Minister of State, Deputy Moran, asking to arrange an urgent deputation meeting, involving him, the Deputies and the other interested party. That is the best I can do in the position I have. I give them my absolute commitment to do that. I have absolute sympathy for the case they have raised.

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Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-06-16/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:54:50+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-06-16