Ireland’s ninth president showed his worth in an impassioned speech.
President Michael D. Higgins and his wife Sabina Higgins hosted a historic gathering of over 220 survivors of the Magdalene Laundries at a special reception at Áras an Uachtaráin on Tuesday afternoon.
For the first-time, survivors of the Magdalene Laundries from Ireland, the UK, the USA and Australia were brought together in Dublin to openly speak about their past experiences and offer their views on how they would like to be commemorated.
The gathering, being organised by a voluntary group, Dublin Honours Magdalenes (DHM), is aimed at fulfilling two key aspects of the Magdalene Restorative Justice Scheme – to bring together Magdalene Laundry survivors to share experiences, and to gather the women’s views on how the Magdalene Laundries should be remembered by future generations.
For many of those travelling from abroad, this is their first time to return home to Ireland since they left after their confinement in the Magdalene Laundry.
During this afternoon’s event, President Higgins spoke openly and candidly to the survivors, apologising profusely for being let down so gravely by the State.
His speech mentioned Ireland’s shameful past when it comes to the Laundries, and the stigma which led women to believe that they had no other choice but to conceal their trauma.
“Sabina and I warmly welcome you all here to Áras an Uachtaráin for what we regard as a most important occasion when so many former residents of the Magdalene laundries have gathered together from around Ireland and from around the world,” he began.
“It is truly a great honour for me, as President of Ireland, and for Sabina to welcome you all to our home. I want to thank you, and those who are accompanying you, for taking the time to be with us this afternoon in Áras an Uachtaráin, the home of the President of Ireland, and, indeed, we hope that your making the decision to spend time together over these few days has the warmest possible outcome for you all.
“It will, I know, be an opportunity for you to share your experiences with each other and perhaps, in some way, to continue to help us all as a society to understand our past, and help us all to heal and come into the light from the darkness of that past.
“Many of you may not know each other. You worked in different Magdalene laundries at different times and the reasons you came to be in the laundries are, I know, varied. Some of you may have spent many years in the laundries and some much shorter periods. As women, you have gone on to live very different lives in different parts of the world. It is only to be expected that your lived experiences, your perspectives on your time in the laundries, and how you reacted to those experiences, will be as diverse as your lives are. The shared common experience of having lived and worked in a Magdalene Laundry, however, makes a bond that you share.
“A combination of stigma, shame and an unreceptive society condemned so many women to concealing their experiences, their trauma, their hurt. In recent years the silence has been broken and you all have helped to let the light into some very dark corners of our shared past. You have presented us with what makes a very harrowing and deeply uncomfortable reflection of an Ireland some would prefer not to be able to recognise, but which has to be acknowledged, transacted and to which a response must be made.
“All of you and of all the other women who cannot be with us today were failed by these institutions, the experience of which you share, and the religious orders that ran them. You were profoundly failed by the State which, in its relationship to these institutions, should have had your welfare at its core. You were failed by Governments that knowingly relied on the existence and practices of these institutions rather than addressing your particular needs in other, more sympathetic ways.
“You were also failed by a society that actively colluded in your incarceration and treatment or chose to look the other way, averted their gaze, as vulnerable girls and women were subjected, in so many cases, to further abuse and degradation.
“Ireland failed you. When you were vulnerable and in need of the support of Irish society and its institutions, its authorities did not cherish you, protect you, respect your dignity or meet your needs and so many in the wider society colluded with their silence.
“Sabina and I are so very privileged that you have given us part of your time, and that you have come to our home, and we wish you all well. Go raibh míle maith agaibh go léir.”
As well as being hosted by President Higgins and Sabina Higgins at Áras an Uachtaráin, the group will also attend a Gala Dinner at The Mansion House in Dublin on the same evening. They will be welcomed by the Minister for Justice and Equality, Charlie Flanagan TD and Lord Mayor MacDonncha.
A number of well-known Irish entertainers will also be performing over the course of the two nights for everyone in attendance, including Christy Moore, Mary Byrne, Róisín O, Philomena Begley, The Three Tenors Ireland, Eurovision winner Dana Rosemary Scallon, and actor Pauline McLynn.
The cast of Riverdance are also set to take to the stage of the Citywest Hotel on the night of 6 June to perform for those who’ve travelled, as well as the Hot House Flowers, who are set to perform at Áras an Uachtaráin on Tuesday 5 June.
In 2013, the McAleese Report found that the State was directly involved in the confinement and forced labour of over 10,000 girls and women in Magdalene Laundries. State officials referred over 25% of the girls and women to the laundries, and the State funded and held laundry service contracts with the institutions while failing to inspect living conditions or requiring wages to be paid.
Then Taoiseach, Mr. Enda Kenny, T.D., offered the official State apology for these abuses on 19 February 2013.
The President’s full speech can be read here.
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