Minister Norma Foley is bringing a plan to Cabinet for a permanent residential abuse commemorative centre on Sean MacDermott Street in Dublin to honour all victims of religious abuse.
The new interpretive centre will be on the site of an old Magdalene laundry, which once accommodated some “fallen women” from the streets of neighbouring Monto, once the largest red light district in Europe.
But while the brothels of Monto were cleared a century ago this year, the Magdalene laundries continued in operation until the 1990s, incarcerating unmarried mothers.
They were held often for decades, carrying out unpaid work for the Catholic Church and its religious orders.
A planning application has already gone in for a campus in which the public can learn about the harsh lives of women forced into manual work for the ‘sin of having a child out of wedlock’.
It was initiated by former Equality minister, Roderic O’Gorman, who said a national centre for records and memorialisation in Seán MacDermott Street was really important for the validation of victims.
Survivor groups were notified overnight of this afternoon’s intended announcement of the conversion of the laundry.
There will be a museum of the Magdalene experience, and an archive run by the National Archives.
It is also believed there will ultimately be some social housing there as well, with an allocation for elderly people as part of the overall concept.
The announcement comes days after work has started on the Tuam mother and baby home site that could contain the remains of 800 infants buried in a septic sewer.
Director Daniel McSweeney and an advisory board have started work, supported by campaigner Catherine Corless.
It was Ms Corless who first uncovered the scale of unregistered burials in Tuam and who brought it to national and international attention.
The legislation allows for identification attempts when human remains are found, with the Government pledging that the best technology that currently exists will be used in the effort to get DNA from those remains that are excavated.
But identification efforts, with family members giving blood samples, will depend on what material is found, and the condition it's in.
Sensitive reburial is on the agenda, and there will be ongoing discussion with with families of former residents, in terms of how respectful reburial can be undertaken at the end of the process.