Survivor Guide Published for Magdalene Women Applying to Commission

The Journal
March 26, 2013

http://www.thejournal.ie/magdalene-survivors-guide-845223-Mar2013/

The site of the former Magdalene Laundry on Sean MacDermott Street in Dublin

The guide for survivors is published ahead of a report by a former High Court judge into how the State can best provide redress and support for the women.

ONE OF THE groups representing survivors of the Magdalene Laundries has published a guide to help the women navigate their way through the Magdalene Commission.

Justice For Magdalenes (JFM) prepared the guide for the survivors ahead of a report by a former High Court judge into how the State can best provide redress and support for the women.

Survivors have been asked to register the fact that they were in one of the laundries before the decision is made on exactly how the fund for survivors will operate.

JFM said the guide to intended as an aid to survivors to create a checklist of their current needs and to help them to prepare to engage with the official process.

The group will circulate the guide to survivors in contact with the organisation as well as to other survivor groups, NGOs, Citizens Information Centres and Family Resource Centres.

Hundreds of women have contacted the Department of Justice to confirm that they were held in the religious institutions since the announcement of a fund set up for survivors earlier this year.

Former High Court judge Mr Justice John Quirke is heading up a review which will last three months and which will establish the best ways to provide redress to survivors of the laundries.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny apologised to survivors in February and said the State deeply regretted the hurt that was done by the Catholic-run institutions.