227 children lost their lives at the protestant Bethany Home. It is now two more years since we erected our memorial, and we still wait on our Government to say that they wronged those who died and those who survived.

The leadership of the Protestant Churches of Ireland have to finally accept their historic responsibility as their counterparts in the Catholic Church did recently in Scotland. 

Church of Ireland Bishop Paul Colton was so moved by the experience of a survivor of the Westbank orphanage that he has called for all Protestant homes to be included in the Mother and Baby Home investigation.

I was one of the first people to sign up to the 1999 Commission to Inquire into Child Abuse –but then I found out Protestants were not to be included.

The state of Ireland has to a duty of care to all citizens, regardless of religious background, and has laws in place with which to protect them. 

We, the undersigned, express serious reservations about the recently published draft terms of reference of the forthcoming southern Irish inquiry into mother and baby homes, and related matters.

Children’s minister James Reilly has said he is “confident” the planned mother and baby home inquiry will have the support of “those most centrally involved”.

Children’s Minister James Reilly is to seek Oireachtas approval for the establishment of the inquiry into mother-and-baby homes before Christmas.

In the wake of the Maíria Cahill affair, the Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin called for a cross-border commission to be established to examine how Sinn Féin and the IRA dealt with abuse cases during the Troubles. Mr Martin said “allegations of a cover-up demand a wider response”.

MAYA ANGELOU, the American writer who died recently wrote ‘History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived but if faced with courage need not be lived again’.

Protestant children who were sent to the Westbank orphanage in Greystones, Co Wicklow, were not told that other residents were their brothers or sisters, mainly lived on baby food and were beaten with clothes hangers and electrical cables.

Northern Protestants who became pregnant outside of marriage were sent to Dublin’s Bethany Home "as a punishment, to add to their shame and to hide the family problem," according to a support group representing the home’s survivors.

May I take this opportunity of drawing to the Taoiseach’s attention, that given the recent deluge of information which is emerging with reference to the Mother and Baby Home at Tuam, Co. Galway, it is becoming imperative that the Government finally takes action to face up to this shocking episode in the history of the State.

Abuse survivors of Bethany Home have welcomed a Government commitment to review any evidence of State responsibility in the negligent treatment of residents at the facility.

The financial contribution from the Department of Justice towards the erection of a memorial headstone at Mount Jerome Cemetery in remembrance of those babies and children who died while in the care of the Bethany Home in Dublin is to be welcomed (Derek Leinster, Remembering Bethany, March 1).

Louise O’Keeffe’s victory against the Irish government in the European Court of Human Rights is a victory for all institutionally abused children. Her bravery and determination deserves the highest commendation.

I want to pay tribute to Dublin City Council, for backing the Bethany Survivors’ Group, and for saying that the State should apologise to, and compensate, Bethany victims.

Listening to the Joe Duffy show last week I was reminded of the contempt the state and Catholic Church has for dumped children, and the very sad history of the victims.

IF we did not deprive them of life, we deprived them of their identity. That is the hard truth about our relationship with “illegitimate” children which Stephen Frears’s film Philomena makes us face.

It was nice to read the Archbishop Michael Jackson’s recent comments on sectarianism alive and well in Dublin. Great that the Bishop has found his moral compass and that he has had the courage to be guided by it in what is Ireland’s shame.

Survivors of the Bethany Home have vowed to take their case to the UN following the Government’s decision not compensate its former residents.

We wish to draw the Taoiseach’s attention to the inaccurate description used to define the Bethany Home, Dublin, when it is referred to as a ‘mother and baby home’ by Mr Kenny and some of his ministerial colleagues.

The Child Abuse Redress Scheme does not apply to all victims equally, says Conor Ryan

Survivors of the Protestant-run Bethany Home have claimed it is a form of “discrimination” that they are excluded from justice or redress granted to victims of Catholic-run institutions.

If the apology proffered by an Taoiseach Enda Kenny on behalf of the government and state to the Magdalene women is one of genuine substance and compassion and not empty rhetoric for public consumption, then all victims, including those survivors of the Protestant-run Bethany Homes, Westbank and St Mary’s in Summer Hill must be part of that apology and be included in the redress scheme.

NOW we know the State’s share of the blame for the slavery of our women in the Magdalene laundries.

Please allow me to respond to Janet Maxwell, Church of Ireland Head of Communications (Letters, Jan 10). She wrote to you on the Protestant evangelical Bethany Home (that closed in 1972), in response to a column by Victoria White and a subsequent Examiner editorial.

The Irish Examiner is to be congratulated for publishing Shaun Connolly’s article (Jul 4) and also Victoria White’s article (Jul 5).

SINN Féin leader Gerry Adams has written to Justice Minister Alan Shatter on behalf of a group of Protestant campaigners seeking to be compensated by the Government for abuse suffered in Government institutions.

THERE are reports that some leaders of Roman Catholic religious orders who represent institutions at which systematic abuse took place are reluctant to meet Ruairi Quinn.

Education Minister Ruairi Quinn will meet survivors of the Bethany Children's Home in Dublin today, to hear calls for their inclusion in the redress scheme for victims of institutional abuse.

A UN committee urged the Government to set up an independent investigation into human rights violations in the Magdalene Laundries and give redress to the women who suffered because of the institutions.

RECORDS held by adoption agency Pact must be put in the public domain so people can access their past, according to a man who spent many years in a Government-funded home but for whom the state has no records.

THE survivors of a Protestant home for unmarried mothers where more than 200 babies died have asked for the Government’s position on including it in the redress scheme.

WE recently sent the following letter to the Archbishop of Dublin.

ERIC CONWAY’S letter of December 17th asserts that an ill defined group he termed the “liberal/feminist commentariat” were, amongst other things, “quite sanguine/blase over Bethany House”.

Almost 220 unmarked graves for forgotten babies who died in a Protestant children’s home were discovered, it was claimed today.

FORMER residents of a Protestant home for children and “fallen women” have reiterated calls for their abuse to be recognised under the government’s Redress scheme.

Former residents of a Protestant children’s home called today for a permanent memorial at the unmarked graves of 40 forgotten babies.

Two victims of child abuse must have their cases addressed by the Residential Institutions Redress Board, it was claimed today.