The Justice for Magdalenes campaign has urged the congregations of
nuns which ran the Magdalene Laundries to make available all records
concerning their former women's homes to the official committee
examining the State's involvement with the institutions.
The campaign also welcomed the nuns' willingness to participate in any Government inquiry into the homes.
Its spokesman, Professor Jim Smith, was speaking after meeting
Minister for Justice & Equality Alan Shatter and junior minister
Kathleen Lynch.
Professor Smith described the two-and-a-half-hour meeting as 'very constructive and positive'.
He said his delegation had been given an assurance that there was the
potential for the campaign to engage with the official fact-finding
committee if its chairman, Senator Martin McAleese, deemed it necessary.
He said that Minister Shatter believed that Senator McAleese would be of that view.
The delegation presented a submission of some 500 pages, which
Professor Smith hoped would help the committee in its work.
It details
involvement by eight Government departments with the laundries.
The campaign's delegation was accompanied by another one from the
Irish Women's Survivors' Network in London, led by Councillor Sally
Mulready.