Debate contribution: Inquiry (Mother and Baby Institutions, Magdalene Laundries and Workhouses) and Redress Scheme Bill: Consideration Stage

Debate contribution by Ms Paula Bradshaw on 19 May 2026.

MLA

Ms Paula Bradshaw

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

19 May 2026

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Executive Committee Business

Heading

Inquiry (Mother and Baby Institutions, Magdalene Laundries and Workhouses) and Redress Scheme Bill: Consideration Stage

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5549818

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Thank you. The amendments in group 2 specifically relate to: "Truth Recovery Redress Service: Entitlement to payment and amount to be paid". As I said, amendment Nos 26 and 27 will not be moved. With your indulgence, Mr Deputy Speaker, I want to refer to an amendment that the Committee proposed that related to the removal of the posthumous eligibility date of 29 September 2011. Notwithstanding the debate about which amendments were or were not selected and the fact that many of us would have liked to have seen that matter debated in the House, the Committee amendment would have broadened eligibility to a range of victims and survivors. However, the amendment was not selected, and, while I absolutely recognise and respect that the selection of amendments is a matter for the judgement of the Speaker, it would have been more appropriate if we had been able to debate it in detail. I have no doubt that the Committee will return to the issue tomorrow, because it was the number-one issue that came before us, whether through written evidence, oral statements or conversations at the round-table meetings. I fully acknowledge the hurt that was caused by the inclusion of that posthumous eligibility date in the first place and that has been caused again by the fact that we have not been given the opportunity to discuss its removal. I will now focus on the amendments in group 2. Amendment No 30 relates to the insertion of the words "more than", rather than just "for", when it comes to cases where an individual should be eligible for more than one payment. I very much acknowledge what the junior Minister said about the potential for people having moved from one institution to another.

The Executive Office and the Office of the Legislative Counsel (OLC), however, have the capability to look at how secondary legislation could be drafted to ensure that clause 31 could be changed to reflect the situation in which someone who was born in an institution, having later become pregnant, found herself, as result of an unfortunate episode, in an institution again. We will therefore support that amendment.

I very much accept some of what the junior Minister said about creating a hierarchy, but that is not our intention. We recognise the pain and suffering and the harm, stigma and abuse that everybody involved in that sorry part of our history endured, but there are particular circumstances involved. We know that a very small number of people were affected. If the amendment is to acknowledge admission half a generation or a generation apart, those persons should be eligible.

I certainly appreciate that. I put on record another element of the evidence that we received, which is that many people, especially the birth mothers, have concerns that, although they have been campaigning for 10, 12 or 14 years, we are only now getting to the stage at which we are debating the legislation for the inquiry. They have serious concerns about how long it will take to set up the inquiry and for it to conduct its business and compile a report, with an individually assessed payment process coming at the far end. There are people in the Gallery today whom the Committee has heard from who are in their mid-to-late 70s. They have said they hope to be but fear that they will not still be on this earth by the time that the individually assessed redress payment scheme is in place. We have to acknowledge the age profile of a lot of victims and survivors, who are depending on the legislation to reflect their needs. Associated with that, Sinéad McLaughlin's amendment is an attempt to factor an inflationary increase into the standardised payment of £10,000. We will support that amendment. I fully agree with it. Not to go back a step, but I thought that, were we to find an amendment that would unify us all, it would have been one that removed the posthumous date, but we are not allowed to debate or vote on such an amendment today, so we will support Sinéad's amendment. We welcome the First Minister and the deputy First Minister's amendment No 34 to clause 32, which will change the process from one that is subject to negative resolution to one that is subject to approval by a resolution of the Assembly. As elected representatives, we should be involved in scrutinising all the delegated legislation and regulations that flow from the Bill. The junior Minister set out clearly why Gerry Carroll's amendment No 45 to schedule 2 would be problematic, as it would have unintended consequences and move the Bill well beyond its scope of supporting the women and their children who endured the harsh conditions of mother-and-baby institutions. I am upset that there were children who are now adults who were in those homes and suffered harm and abuse, but I feel that the amendment would take the Bill way beyond its scope and could unintentionally open it up to wider applications. Amendment No 46 to schedule 3 would insert the words "the mother of the deceased". Again, I am very sympathetic to that amendment. I am, by no means, an expert on the law of intestacy or on the European Convention on Human Rights, and I would certainly take counsel from the junior Minister in her warning about the particular circumstances here and unintended consequences. While I am again sympathetic to the fact that birth mothers are not eligible for a posthumous payment for their deceased child, we will oppose the amendment but only on the grounds of its potential unintended consequences. That is everything at this stage.

947 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

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