Mother-and-baby Institutions, Magdalene Laundries and Workhouses: Public Consultation on a Statutory Inquiry and Redress Schemes

Part of Ministerial Statements – in the Northern Ireland Assembly at 10:45 am on 25 June 2024.

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Photo of Michelle O'Neill Michelle O'Neill Sinn Féin 10:45, 25 June 2024

The public consultation is about gathering all the information, about the framework on which we will proceed and about giving powers to the panel and the inquiry to scope out all the information on how women ended up in the institutions and what happened to their children in mother-and-baby cases. We need to find out all that information to take it forward.

We have already started the work of engagement with the institutions. As I said in relation to historical institutional abuse, we need to pursue the institutions. They have to pay redress, because that is also part of the healing process. That will be an ongoing piece of work as we move through this area of work now. The priority for the consultation is to put a shape to the inquiry: what the inquiry will look at, what its scope should be and the panel work as well. This is very informative, but it is absolutely an opportunity for us to get this right in this instance. We are all determined to do that.