Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Far from hiding and denying the truth, the Government has exposed the truth and has now set about a process of dealing with that truth.

I expect the Deputy will agree that the Government commissioned the report and received and published it yesterday. It is 1,000 pages long. I think the Deputy said it was 1,400 pages long.

We are at the start of a process. If Deputy McGrath wants to involve himself in this exercise, I advise him to read all of the report carefully and make his contribution when the Dáil discusses it in two weeks time. It is important that we attempt to understand the scale of what happened to the women in the Magdalen laundries, and the circumstances and needs of the survivors of the laundries. Yesterday's publication of the McAleese report is the start of that process. If the Deputy wants to involve himself in that seriously, he should read the report. I will value his contribution, as an elected representative from Tipperary, when he comes back on the next occasion.

I have said, and I repeat on behalf of the State and the Government, that I am sorry all of these women had to go through the environment in which they lived in the Magdalen laundries. We now have a duty, in understanding the truth and believing their stories, to act on that. We deserve the opportunity to put that process in place and to attempt to bring closure and reconciliation in lives that were damaged by that process.

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