Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It is difficult for people my age and younger to comprehend that places such as these laundries existed as institutions. It is extremely difficult to believe that people ended up in such places, stigmatised by society, forgotten, and abandoned in some cases by family. For too long Governments have not adequately addressed the plight of the women in question. This Government, following an agreement in 2011 set up the independent committee, chaired by Dr. McAleese to establish the facts and level of State involvement. It is unfortunate that within hours of its publication some in this House expected that the Government give a full State apology. This ignores the complexities of the issues and the length of the report which was to be considered and the individual cases within that report.

I acknowledge the generous amount of time that the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste gave yesterday to hearing the important stories of victims, stories that need to be heard. I commend the Government, the Taoiseach, the Minister for Justice, Equality and Defence, Deputy Shatter, and the Minister for State, Deputy Kathleen Lynch, for their work and welcome the publication of the report. I also welcome the Taoiseach's immediate response on the report's publication and his intention to have a full Dáil debate on this issue next week. This will be an important part of the resolution process in this most difficult part of our nation's history.

The effects on those housed in the laundries are felt today. Testimony from one Galway survivor states that she still suffers nightmares 50 years on. There are plenty of examples of emotional and physical abuse, of seclusion and humiliation of women in some previous reports. Those reports have also shown how a frenzied public morality combined with a dominant religious force and indifferent governments transformed nineteenth century refuges into twentieth century prisons and labour camps. The purpose of the report was to document the extent of the State's collusion in the laundries. It is accepted in the report that up to 25% of entries had some kind of State involvement. Amongst the remaining 75% of entries were those from families, from the Church or self-admission, amongst many others. The report highlights that those who entered the institutions were expected to work without pay in what were cold harsh places and that some girls were placed in these institutions from industrial schools or by their own families without any understanding of why they were there or how long they would remain.

The report points to the laundry facility in Forster Street in Galway, founded in 1824, the running and operation of which the Sisters of Mercy took over in 1845. It had a capacity of 110 individuals and various occupancy rates, from 110 in 1951, to 73 in 1954 and 18 in 1984 the year of its closure. There were gaps in the information in the records of the Galway Magdalen laundry. When I spoke on this issue in the House last October I reported having seen copies of the 1911 census which showed women of all ages, all Roman Catholic and from nearly every county, in the laundry in Galway. In 2009 a sculpture was dedicated in Galway to those women who endured life in the Mercy laundry. The statue is of a woman in institutional garb holding a sheet aloft to symbolise her enforced endless hours of work, a simple but provocative sculpture. The survivors deserve closure and I am confident this closure will come very soon.

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