Michael Colreavy (Sligo-North Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Is Ireland's legal and political system incompatible with justice?

We are still discussing the Magdalene laundries and we are not even considering the Bethany Home. I am obliged to wonder about how we, as a society, have let these people down.

The Magdalene laundries are a great stain on the history of Ireland in the 20th century. By voting in favour of the motion, Members have the opportunity to ensure that these laundries will not also become a stain on Ireland in the 21st century. The purpose of the motion is to acknowledge the suffering the State participated in bringing about. It also calls on the State to acknowledge the need for immediate and meaningful discussions on the need for both an apology and redress. This State's treatment of women during the 20th century can only be described as appalling. The Magdalene laundries are a horrific example of how the State turned a blind eye to the obvious mistreatment and abuse of women that was perpetrated by religious orders. To this day, however, nothing has been done to address the plight of those to whom I refer. Thanks to good investigative journalism, the vast majority of people living in this country now know of the terrible deeds that were done and the justice that was inflicted on these women but the State has failed to issue a quick and comprehensive acknowledgement of their needs.

Since assuming office, Labour and Fine Gael have not dealt comprehensively with the outcome of the previous Government's refusal to include the Magdalene women in the residential institutions redress scheme or to provide a separate redress mechanism or an apology. This is not good enough. Many of the women who were detained in the laundries are aging and time is of the essence in the context of bringing about a resolution. Many of the women in question are also unwell and this is partly, if not wholly, due to the time they spent incarcerated in the laundries. To add insult to injury, they cannot gain access to the pensions to which they are entitled after engaging in so many years of gruelling labour for the religious orders. This is because those orders did not pay the women for their work and nor did they file normal annual employer returns to Revenue. The latter was despite the fact that they ran the laundries as commercial enterprises.

In order for justice to be done, the Government must act now rather than allowing matters to continue to drift. The Irish Human Rights Commission, in an assessment report compiled in 2010, found that women who were locked up in Magdalene laundries suffered serious abuses of their human rights. The commission called on the Government to immediately establish a statutory inquiry into their treatment and to provide redress to the survivors, as appropriate. It was supported in this regard by the UN Committee against Torture, which recommended that the State should institute prompt, independent and thorough investigations and, in appropriate cases, bring prosecutions, in addition to affording redress, compensation and rehabilitation to former residents of the Magdalene laundries. There can be no doubt that what these women suffered in those laundries was nothing short of torture.

The Government cannot shy away from the responsibility is has to these women on behalf of Irish society. The purpose of the motion is to challenge the Government to take the immediate measures necessary to support the women on the basis of the extensive information that is already in the public domain. It is essential that the Government should take action. Every backbencher should support the motion because justice delayed is justice denied. We should not deny these women justice any longer.

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