Tears As Magdalene women Get Official Apology

Taoiseach Enda Kenny fought back tears as he delivered an official state apology to the women who were treated like slaves in Catholic-run Magdalene Laundries.

Several dozen survivors of institutes were present in the public gallery of the Dail, as Mr Kenny said sorry on behalf of the country for the suffering the women endured.

"What we discuss today is your story," the Taoiseach told them during his speech.

"What we address today is how you took this country's terrible 'secret' and made it your own.

"Burying it, carrying it in your hearts here at home, or with you to England and to Canada, America and Australia on behalf of Ireland and the Irish people.

"But from this moment on you need carry it no more, because today, we take it back."

The full extent of the conditions in which they were forced to work for no pay were revealed in a report published earlier this month by Dr Martin McAleese, husband of former president Mary McAleese.

Since its publication, Mr Kenny has met with several survivors, and even travelled to London to meet with some survivors there.

In his speech, he said there was no excuse for how Irish society turned its back on the women, who were put in the institutions by their families and the State, with the encouragement of a powerful clergy at the time.

He said: "For generations Ireland had created a particular portrait of itself as a good-living, God-fearing nation. Through this and other reports we know this flattering self-portrait to be fictitious.

"It would be easy to explain away all that happened, all we did in those great moral and social salves of 'the culture back then', the 'order of the day', 'the terrible times that were in it'.

"Yes by any standards it was a cruel, pitiless Ireland, distinctly lacking in a quality of mercy. That much is clear, both from the ages of the report, and from the stories of the women I met.

"As I sat with these women, as they told their stories, it was clear that while every woman's story was different, each of them shared a particular experience of a particular Ireland - judgemental, intolerant, petty and prim.

"In the laundries themselves some women spent weeks, others months, more of them years.

"But the thread that ran through their many stories was a palpable sense of suffocation, not just physical in that they were incarcerated, but psychological, spiritual, social."

The government had been criticised for not apologizing immediately in the wake of the reports publication, but the considered nature of Mr Kenny's apology has earned widespread plaudits.

Mr Kenny, clearly moved by the stories of the women he had met, struggled to maintain his composure as he finished his speech with an apology.

"As a society, for many years we failed you. We forgot you or, if we thought of you at all, we did so in untrue and offensive stereotypes.

"This is a national shame, for which I again say, I am deeply sorry and offer my full and heartfelt apologies.

"At the conclusion of my discussions with one group of the Magdelen Women one of those present sang 'Whispering Hope'. A line from that song stays in my mind - 'when the dark midnight is over, watch for the breaking of day'.

"Let me hope that this day and this debate heralds a new dawn for all those who feared that the dark midnight might never end."

The Magdalene women in the public gallery rose to their feet to give the Taoiseach a standing ovation.

In response, all the politicians present rose to their feet to applaud the women.

It was a moving moment for the national parliament.

Outside afterwards, the women expressed their delight with the apology, saying the Taoiseach had gone even further than they had expected.

"He didn't hold back on anything," said Maureen Sullivan, who was put into a laundry at the age of 12 after her father died.

"He really did us proud. Now we can go on with our lives and we know that we've got an apology, and he's taken responsibility. It's just fantastic."

"I was never proud of anything in Ireland until today. He did the whole country proud and we re-wrote history this evening."

The government has appointed a High Court judge to set up a compensations scheme to offer redress to the women in the coming months.

There are also plans to build a permanent memorial.