Magdalene Report Imminent

By Maria Tracey
The Cork News
February 1, 2013

thecorknews.ie/articles/magdalene-report-imminent-9303

The committee director of the Justice for Magdalenes (JFM) group has called for a State apology and compensation for victims ahead of the publication of a long awaited report on the Magdalene Laundries, due next week.

Mari Steed, whose mother spent 10 years at the laundries in Sunday's Well said an apology would relieve the “stigma” and “shame” felt by women who were detained at the Magdalene Laundries.

Ms Steed believes an apology should follow the findings of an interdepartmental report- prepared by a committee of officials from five Government departments- expected to be published next Tuesday, February 5th.

The move, added Ms. Steed, would give a degree of closure to the estimated 30,000 single mothers and other women who were detained between 1922 and 1996 by four religious congregations- the Sisters of Mercy, Good Shepherd Sisters, Sisters of Charity and Sisters of Our Lady of Charity.

Ms Steed was born at Cork’s Bessboro mother-baby home in 1960 and adopted to the US in 1961. Her mother, who now lives in England, spent 10 years at the Sunday's Well institution run by the order of the Good Shepherd Sisters. The two were reunited in 2002.

“It’s all the women really want, for the State and religious orders to accept responsibility. One woman told me all she wants is a nun to get down on her knees and apologise. It would go some way towards healing the stigma attached to being in the laundries, as it was shameful thing for many women. My own mother carried the stigma and had no problem talking about being an unmarried mother but not about the laundries. She was stripped of her family there. She was stripped of her life,” she said.

Ms Steed said victims face a “nail biting” wait ahead of the release of the report on Tuesday, but hoped it would “confirm” and “echo” what JFM and the UN Committee Against Torture (UNCAT) have worked to highlight in recent years.

In 2011, UNCAT said that it was “gravely concerned at the failure of the State to protect girls and women who were involuntarily confined between 1922 and 1996 in the Magdalene Laundries”. The report highlighted that “prompt, independent and thorough” investigations should be carried out and that perpetrators should be held accountable. It also says that former residents should obtain redress and have a right to compensation and rehabilitation.

“I don’t think next week's report will go against that,” said Ms Steed. The report- set up to investigate the State’s role in relation to the laundries in 2011- was initially due last September however, the committee felt it would be improper to conclude its work without examining additional material from representative and advocacy groups. “We can only hope that this gets the ball rolling, so women can look ahead. We don’t want to see it delayed and delayed for six months to a year,” she said.

Ms Steed called for a reparation scheme for women incarcerated in Ireland’s Magdalene laundries to be implemented, to include pension entitlements by the Department of Social Protection and wages that were never paid.