Ms Catherine Hynes:

The industrial schools received a licence to operate. They could only have the number of children within that institution for whom they were licensed. We know from the Ryan report and other narratives that, in fact, the numbers often exceeded the number for which they were licensed. We have a difficulty with tracking children through the system. Take the example of an institution such as Marlborough House. Marlborough House was a detention centre for children who were waiting to be seen by the courts. However, from Marlborough House one could easily have ended up being referred to one of the industrial schools or the reformatory schools, so there would be a degree of overlap. Looking back, we now know the scale of systemic abuse that existed in these organisations. We have limited information about, for example, the numbers that were licensed to operate.