Fiona O'Loughlin (Kildare South, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this Bill and Fianna Fáil supports it because it does allow for payments to a cohort of women who worked in the Magdalen laundries but were resident in adjoining institutions. It is important that it will expand the Redress for Women Resident in Certain Institutions Act 2015 to apply these health benefits to those women who worked in the institutions covered by the Magdalen restorative justice ex gratia scheme while residing in certain adjoining institutions in order that they too can avail of these health benefits.

The survivors' stories of the women who were residents of the Magdalen laundries and similar institutions are a scar on our history. It behoves all of us to ensure that all these women are finally taken care of by this State. We owe it to this group of women that they are financially compensated and provided for with the same health benefits that were awarded. We have always been of the view that we are dealing with a limited number of vulnerable women and that the State has an obligation to honour its commitments and ensure a more generous application of the scheme. Some of the women who worked in the Magdalen laundries were wrongly refused access to the original redress scheme and we have always felt that this was manifestly unfair. It is good that this amendment Bill addresses the needs of this group of women.

It is really important to note that the Bill ensures that awards received are not taken into account when assessments are made for nursing home supports. It is also important to note that it expands counselling services to some women who were not previously covered. This counselling scheme is vital for the healing of survivors, many of whom have repressed the memories of their experiences in the laundries to the detriment of their physical and mental health.

The Ombudsman, in the report entitled Opportunity Lost, criticised the omission of some survivors who were deemed to lack capacity and several women who were forced to work in Magdalen laundries as children, and we welcome the fact that full and careful consideration is now being given to the recommendations of this report. Ireland must never forget these women. Their identities were taken, their hair was cut, their names were taken from them and they were the victims of grave injustices and human rights abuses. Society shunned them, the State abused them and the church exploited them.

It was incredibly moving to witness events last June when Norah Casey and a very dedicated group of volunteers brought these women home to Dublin. It could not be described as a happy, as Norah Casey said at the time, because there was so much sadness but it was important to acknowledge what these women had gone through and to acknowledge their survival. This dark and difficult chapter of our history is the life story of the survivors from those who have sat in the Public Gallery to those who have spoken publicly about their experiences and those who still feel the stigma of having been in these institutions. I do not think that will ever leave them. We are morally obliged to future generations and past ones to remember the successes and the tragic mistakes that have shaped this country.

See this speech in context