Debate contribution: Inquiry (Mother and Baby Institutions, Magdalene Laundries and Workhouses) and Redress Scheme Bill: Consideration Stage
Debate contribution by Ms Carál Ní Chuilín on .
- MLA
- Ms Carál Ní Chuilín
- Party at the time
- Sinn Féin
- 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 5549864
Read the official Assembly record
Text
Like all Members, I thank everybody, particularly survivors, victims and their families, their support groups, everybody who was with them from the start and the people who took the first steps to get us to where we are today — also the Department, departmental officials and our own Committee people. There has been a really good collegiate approach to this. Before I talk about the second group of amendments, which relates to the truth recovery redress service, entitlement to payment and amount to be paid, I want to bring us back to the first page of the Bill. It talks about:
"Make provision relating to a Truth Recovery Public Inquiry into Mother and Baby Institutions, Magdalene Laundries and Workhouses between 1922 and 1995; to establish the Truth Recovery Redress Service and to enable payments to be made to or in respect of certain persons; and for connected purposes."
Like all Members, I am acutely aware of the rules. I am not talking about which amendment was or was not accepted. I want to talk about why this has really upset a lot of us. There are people in the Public Gallery and people watching this. People are watching this in various rooms throughout the Assembly. They feel that the state, because of its construction from partition onwards, put women and girls into institutions, othered them and made them less than, and they now feel, after the events of the weekend, that this is mark 2: 2026, rather than 1922. It is on that context that we need to focus. It is for those people, including all those who have gone. We do not know where some of them rest, and some do not know where their babies are. All we know is that they were put in those institutions because the context of the day was patriarchal and misogynistic. Women and girls were othered. As I said this morning, girls as young as 14 were pregnant in an institution and not one person asked how they became pregnant, even though they suspected that it was through rape or incest. That is the context that we are talking about. Frankly, I understand that people need to talk about human rights and legislation and different aspects of the law. However, just for the purpose of this, remember the people who are not here. We need to make sure, in some way or other, that we do our best through the legislation, and we said that this morning.
I agree 100%, Linda. That is something that we all agree on. We met many people. The Bill was published and was based on the report of the truth recovery process. The most enlightening and insightful thing for me, and, I am sure, for many of us on the Committee, was that, after our call for evidence, all those people very bravely stepped into one of the intimidating Committee rooms and told us their stories. Some of us had heard those stories before, but others had never heard them, and we need to make sure that those stories and people are reflected in the legislation as best we can manage it. I also understand that, on the redress service and entitlement for payment, as Sinéad, Paula and everyone said, this is just a standardised payment to recognise that someone went through one of those institutions. The other payments that will come later will certainly reflect the awful trauma that they experienced. We support your amendment, Sinéad. We certainly support it now, given that the posthumous date has been removed. We cannot support your amendment, Gerry, with the £20,000 figure, because there were lots of figures that were thrown out, some as high as £50,000. Money was not an issue for many people: the issue was the date of 1922. We want to make sure that the money goes to the people and no excuses are made. There is money there, and there is no excuse for people not getting their standardised payment. I understand that you have been speaking to victims and survivors and listening to what they have told you. You have a right to table your amendment. I spoke to many in the Public Gallery about this, this morning, so I do not want anybody hearing it from Sinn Féin for the first time. I am just giving them their place. I would like clarification from you, Gerry, on amendment No 30 to clause 31. I am not really sure what you mean when you talk about enabling a person born in an institution and admitted to more than one such institution to make multiple claims. I have just written that down very roughly. Like Sinéad, I just want to find out what it means, because none of us wants to —. I will say this: had we spoken to each other before the amendment earlier, we could have had 28 days now instead of 21. Therefore, I ask people to be flexible. We will have other opportunities to amend the Bill. If that flexibility means taking the amendment back to look at it so that we fully understand it before returning to it, there will be other opportunities to bring it forward. The advice that we have been given rings alarm bells. We do not want to do anything that will have unintended consequences, including leaving the scheme open to being taken advantage of by others who might not be entitled to do so. I will not go into further detail. Gerry, we cannot support the amendment that relates to three additional homes and their residents. Paula gave a good rationale for that. I understand that that will cause disappointment, but the amendment would open the scheme up and have unintended consequences that would go beyond the scope of the Bill. However, as we have said, if we can talk about the intent and you can address what that is, we can certainly look at it. I have been here since 2007, and, I have to say, this is one of the most important pieces of legislation that we will ever introduce. Despite some of the concerns that have been raised, what is important about what has happened in redress and entitlement is the story behind it, which was briefly touched on this morning. Young women and girls — Protestant, Catholic, Dissenter — often went to institutions of a different religion in order to have privacy. The institutions, whether or not they were religious, were part of the state. They had the state's permission to do what they wanted to those children and those women, because that is what they were. It was often a case of, "If you don't see it, you don't hear it, and you can't address it". This legislation is about our saying to people, "We see you, we hear you, and we will address these concerns to make sure that there is a proper settlement and entitlement". I will talk about other issues that relate to the amendments in group 3, but I will dip into group 1 to make a point about transparency and accountability. I majored on clause 17 and, in particular, the use of public immunity certificates, because the institutions covered everything up. Their behaviour was collusive, they were coercive, and they did not care about the impact on the women and their children. As we know from people who have contacted us, it is not only about people not knowing where their parents or grandparents are. Some people had the wrong birth certificates, and some birth certificates were falsified. Other people were brought across the border very conveniently; in fact, you could get children across the border quicker than you could get a pound of butter. That is to quote one of the victims and survivors — she knows who she is. Nobody turned a blind eye; everyone knew that it was going on. Should the standardised payment be £10,000 or £12,000, it is just about saying that that is what it is, but, further down the line, when we go through the inquiry, we need to ensure that the institutions not only pay their fair due but hand over their records. The state needs to hand over its records, too. The Department of Health cannot hide behind the fact that it has a shortage of social workers. Yet again, TEO is stepping in to ensure that those people's records are accessed.
There are already many impediments, and we want to make sure that we get the legislation right. Why I sought clarification from you, Gerry, was to make the point that I agree with the principle of what you are doing, but it is ultimately about the unintended consequences of your amendments. I therefore appeal to you to withdraw at least one or two of them, and we can then come back to the matter.
Members have referred to entitlement to the payment to be made by the institutions and the state. That is addressed in the group 2 amendments. The Committee was insulted to receive correspondence from one of the religious institutions stating that it cost money for it to keep women and girls. That is what we were dealing with. We felt insulted on behalf of those women and girls. For me, that displayed the arrogance of such institutions and the context that allowed that patriarchal, misogynistic, abusive and coercive behaviour to flourish for decades. We want to make sure that, through the Truth Recovery Redress Service, there are no free passes for religious institutions or for the state. I genuinely look forward to hearing what Gerry has to say. I hope that we can get through the rest of the amendments without having too many Divisions. I respect people's right to table amendments, however. It is a pity that some of the amendments that the Committee tabled were not selected for debate and were therefore not heard.
1,658 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
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