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TAOISEACH ENDA KENNY has stopped short of apologising for the State’s involvement in the Magdalene Laundries.
In a heated exchange in the Dáil this afternoon, the Taoiseach repeatedly said he was sorry that the stigma attached to the women in the laundries was not removed before now.
He also apologised for the length of time it had taken for a government to carry out a report into the institutions and said he was sorry that the women lived “in that kind of environment”.
The long-awaited report by Senator Martin McAleese into the laundries was published at 4pm. The report has found the Irish State was directly and fundamentally involved in the laundries.
Survivors of the laundries say they were unhappy with the Taoiseach’s initial response.
“That is not an apology,” Maureen Sullivan said.
“This is not acceptable. It is a cop out,” Stephen O’Riordan, spokesperson for Magdalene Survivors Together said.
The Taoiseach was responding to questions from Sinn Féin’s Mary Lou McDonald who described the laundries as an Irish form of slavery and asked when the Taoiseach would be offering a full apology to the survivors.
In response, Enda Kenny said that the thousand-page report needs to be read in full before reacting to it. He said he plans to hold a Dáil debate on the report in two weeks.
The Taoiseach repeatedly emphasised the ways in which women entered the laundries, noting that 10 per cent of women were sent to one by their family while 19 per cent of women entered themselves. He said that the report reflected Ireland between the 1920s and 1950s which was a “harsh and uncompromising and authoritarian” country.
The Taoiseach said that the State was responsible for making or facilitating 26.5 per cent of admissions to the laundries.
Mary Lou McDonld told the Taoiseach that the women in the laundries were not “residents voluntarily offering their labour [but] young, vulnerable women” who believed themselves to be imprisoned.
(Video: Thejournalvideo/YouTube)
Additional reporting by Sinead O’Carroll
So a no-deal Brexit would be bad for the economy but so would an orderly Brexit. And does anyone really believe that inflation is only 1 percent per annum in this country? I assume the Central Bank guy is not renting accommodation or paying crèche fees.
@Earth Traveller: yes…inflation is low. Are any of your day to day products in a basket of goods going up?
@Earth Traveller: yes…inflation is low. Are any of your day to day products in a basket of goods going up? Competition is driving retail prices down. The majority of people own their homes and interest rates are dropping…
@joe: yes they absolutely are
More tax from FFG …
Our central banks “expert” analysis seems to be to look at the current number and then add a little bit onto that!
And aren’t we all so lucky that FFG never brought us to the brink of recession!
Its always somebody else’s fault, brexit, or the financial crash, or the butterfly that flapped its wings the wrong way in brazil, its never the fault of the useless idiots in dail eireann.
We need to stand up stop thinking about how bad it will be without England financially and start thinking about Irish unity and how it will benefit us as a nation of course if won’t benefit us straight away but a few years down the line it will. Those figures the central bank send out I would take them with a grain of salt .Time to stop moaning and get on with it.
@Donal Carey: what if the vote goes the other way ,what then and it is likely to do that as the uncertainty that is around the corner
@Donal Carey: we really don’t want or need that money pit!
@FlopFlipU: Negative everything points to a United Ire and it’s about time
Once northern Ireland see how britain has betrayed them, it will a work itself out.
What will they use to scare us with when its all sorted.
Is this the same regulator that predicted a soft landing at the height of the Celtic tiger?
The banks will be a great help to struggling people. They give you an umbrella when the sun is out, then take it off you when it’s raining
Scare mungering again like 12 years ago
@Joseph Molloy:
You may have missed it, but 12 years ago the proverbial muck hit the fan in this country like never before and we’re still suffering the consequences. Where exactly do you see the scaremongering?
Brexit won’t happen. English are stupid alright but not economically suicidal. London is the powerhouse and voted remain. Money talks.
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