OPEN LETTER: The Cabinet is to discuss the legacy of
the Magdalene laundries. It is time for an official apology for the
abuse meted out there.
DEAR MEMBERS of the Cabinet,
On behalf
of the Justice for Magdalenes advocacy group, we are writing to solicit
your support for survivors of Ireland’s Magdalene laundries.
The
Cabinet, we understand, is expected to take up this matter.
Almost
six months ago, the Irish Human Rights Commission published its
assessment of our application for an inquiry, in which we documented
human rights violations in the laundry institutions.
The assessment
recommended that the State “establish a statutory mechanism to
investigate the matters advanced by Justice for Magdalenes, and, in
appropriate cases, to grant redress where warranted”.
The
assessment details the State’s historical failure to adequately protect
women and girls from abusive conditions, specifically from wrongful and
unlawful detention, inhuman and degrading treatment, and forced labour
and servitude. It also recognises the importance of restorative justice
for aging and elderly women.
On November 11th, 2010, the then
taoiseach Brian Cowen referred the commission’s assessment for review by
the attorney general. On March 23rd, 2011, Minister for Justice Alan
Shatter announced he was considering “a draft submission for the
Government” on the matter.
The Cabinet will now decide what happens. We
ask you to consider the following.
No representative of Irish
society has apologised to these institutional abuse survivors. The
laundries were not included in the Residential Institutional Redress
Act, 2002. These women were excluded from the Residential Institutions
Redress Board. They are the nation’s disappeared, abandoned and shunned
in the present as in the past.
For almost two years, Justice for
Magdalenes worked with various government departments in advocating for
survivors’ needs. In September 2009, the then minister for education,
Batt O’Keeffe, rejected our group’s initial proposal for a distinct
redress scheme. He asserted that the State “did not refer individuals,
nor was it complicit in referring individuals to the laundries”.
The
previous government argued that the laundries were privately owned and
operated and so did not come within the responsibility of the State.
Justice
for Magdalenes rejects this position. It is now a matter of public
record that the courts entered into arrangements whereby women given a
suspended sentence were sent to a Magdalene laundry rather than prison.
Likewise, members of the judiciary placed women “on probation” and “on
remand” at these same institutions.
The department of education
knew in 1970 that there were at least “70 girls between the age of 13
and 19 years confined in this way who should properly be dealt with
under the reformatory schools system”.
Meanwhile, the department of
health was paying a capitation grant for young “problem” girls sent to
these convent institutions in the 1980s. As late as 1982, the department
of defence met the religious congregations to discuss the insertion of a
“fair wage clause” in laundry contracts, contracts that were issued
without such a clause since at least 1941.
At no time did the
State license, regulate or inspect the Magdalene laundries, which always
operated on a for-profit basis. Consequently, survivors do not receive a
pension for their compulsory yet unpaid work in harsh conditions.
After
1953 there was a statutory obligation governing employers’ withholding
of pension contributions. The nuns made no contributions for the workers
in the laundries. The State did not enforce the law.
The women do
not receive healthcare or education to assist them in overcoming the
physical and psychological effects of abuse and exploitation suffered in
the laundries. Compounding their trauma, many of the women continue to
feel a deep sense of stigma and shame.
They experience the
Government’s unwillingness to take meaningful political action as the
pursuit of the policy “deny ’til they die”.
Justice for Magdalenes
submitted a revised Restorative Justice and Reparations Scheme to Alan
Shatter on March 29th. This reflects the group’s ongoing dialogue and
consultation with individual survivors in Ireland, the US and the UK.
In
addition to an apology, the women are seeking a lump sum compensation
scheme, a statutory pension reflecting their years of work in the
laundry institutions, and complete access to their records. They are not
interested in an extension of the current redress scheme, which would
involve a stressful adversarial legal process incompatible with their
age and vulnerable position in life.
Justice for Magdalenes is
also seeking support for its campaign in the international human rights
arena. We recently made a formal submission to the United Nations
Committee Against Torture, which, on May 23rd and 24th, is due to
examine Ireland for the first time on the extent to which it is meeting
its human rights obligations.
Justice for Magdalenes’s submission
draws attention to the continuing degrading treatment suffered by the
women, and to Ireland’s legal duties to promptly and impartially
investigate allegations of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading
treatment, and to ensure redress for the victims of such treatment.
Justice
for Magdalenes asks for the State’s assistance in bringing the church
and the religious orders to the table. We continue to reach out to the
four religious congregations that operated the laundries, and to members
of the Irish hierarchy.
The orders refuse to meet with us; they do not
answer our correspondence. We did meet Cardinal Seán Brady in June 2010,
and he characterised Justice for Magdalenes’s presentation as “fair and
balanced”.
Moreover, he recommended that we approach Cori, the
Conference of Religious of Ireland, as a way to facilitate dialogue with
the congregations. However, Cori refused our request for a meeting, on
October 1st, 2010.
The State and Catholic Church both need to
acknowledge that the women who spent time in the nation’s Magdalene
laundries are survivors of institutional abuse, that they were not at
fault, but instead had a grave injustice perpetrated upon them.
An
apology is a significant signal that the Republic of Ireland is prepared
to right past injustices.
Your decision on these matters will
have real and meaningful consequences. We urge you to lead us all as
citizens on the path towards fairness and equality, and to right a
historical wrong that remains otherwise a dishonour to the nation.
Sincerely,
James Smith, associate professor, English & Irish studies, Boston College;
Mari Steed, director, Justice For Magdalene co-ordinating committee;
Claire McGettrick, Angela Murphy and Judy Campbell, Justice For Magdalene committees;
Katherine O’Donnell, women’s studies, School of Social Justice, UCD;
Maeve O’Rourke, Harvard Law School 2010 global human rights Fellow;
Cllr Sally Mulready, chairwoman, Irish Women Survivors Network, London;
Mary McAuliffe, women’s studies, School of Social Justice, UCD;
Sandra McAvoy, women’s studies, UCC;
Paddy Doyle, author of
The God Squad ;
Tom Kitt, former co-chairman of Oireachtas ad-hoc committee/Magdalene laundries;
Michael Kennedy, former co-chairman of Oireachtas ad-hoc committee/Magdalene laundries.