The UN has again criticised the refusal by the four orders than ran the Magdalene laundries to offer any money towards compensating survivors.

Less than one-third of Magdalene Laundry survivors have received compensation from the State — one year after Taoiseach Enda Kenny apologised to victims in the Dáil.

Cardinal Sean Brady’s assistant and coadjutor in the diocese of Armagh has said the religious orders who ran Magdalene laundries need to “consider their responsibilities in a compassionate manner”.

Some survivors of the Magdalene laundries will be paid tax free compensation before Christmas, it has been revealed.

Magdalene Laundry survivors plan to protest outside the provincial headquarters of a religious order which has refused to contribute to the State’s redress scheme.

The Catholic Church is as imaginative and determined as any fallen Celtic Tiger high roller when it comes to trying to protect assets.

The Government has ruled out legal action to force religious orders to contribute to a compensation fund for survivors of the Magdalene Laundries.

The Cabinet has criticised a refusal by religious orders to pay into a compensation fund for Magdalene Laundry survivors.

The religious orders responsible for running the Magdalene Laundries have told the Government they will not contribute to the fund set-up for survivors.

There was a mixed reaction among Magdalene Laundry survivors and representative groups to the recommendations in the Quirke Report.

Orders of nuns involved in the operation of the Magdalene Laundries have been urged by TDs to make a contribution to a survivors’ compensation fund.

The Government is refusing to say what contributions it will seek from religious orders for a fund being established for victims of the Magdalene laundries.

Four orders that ran Magdalene laundries made €296m from property deals, write Claire O’Sullivan and Conor Ryan

Religious orders which operated the Magdalene laundries have insisted that they believe their role was to provide care and refuge.

‘WE should make every effort to induce them to remain in the asylum... where they are assured of the grace of a happy death.”

A religious order has refused to offer any explanation as to why four women who died in its care are named as being buried in two different locations.

Many believe that it was the Government decision to make Senator Martin McAleese chairman of the interdepartmental group that brought the religious orders on board.

Gardaí believe the fire which gutted a listed former convent building in Cork City was started deliberately.

It was 1972 and Sr Colette Hickey of the Good Shepherd Sisters saw an urgent need to provide a shelter for women and children in Cork who couldn’t remain in their own homes due to domestic violence.

The controversy over the amount of money the religious orders should pay to indemnify the state for compensation in relation to the abuse highlighted in the Ryan Report has no more to do with the tenets of faith or religion than the actual abuse had anything to do with religion.

THE academic leading the Justice for Magdalene group said he believed an apology from the Government was imminent and that statutory pensions should then be provided to “hundreds” of survivors.

LAND surrounding a former mass grave at the largest Magdalene Laundry was quietly sold by the order of nuns who ran it for €61.8 million during the boom.

MAGDALENE laundry survivors have called for an apology as well as basic compensation from the state in the form of a pension.

MAGDALENE Laundry survivors have welcomed the setting up of a committee to probe the depth of the state’s role in the workhouses but criticised the Government for failing to immediately apologise to former female residents.

THE four religious congregations that ran the Magdalene houses in Ireland have agreed to help achieve justice for thousands of women who were forced to work in the laundries.

JUSTICE Minister Alan Shatter is under pressure to announce an inquiry into the detention and abuse of women at the Magdalene Laundries after the UN criticised the state’s failure to protect the women and called for a thorough investigation and compensation scheme.

The Magdalene laundry women have been boosted by a report from the Irish Human Rights Commission that calls for a statutory inquiry into the institutions, writes Claire O’Sullivan.

MINISTER for Education Batt O’Keeffe was under pressure last night to admit that the state was involved in sending women to Magdalene Laundries after Department of Justice officials admitted to former Magdalene women that they and the Irish judiciary system sent women to the laundries.

THE Sisters of Mercy have offered to contribute cash and properties worth over €127.5m in compensation to the victims of physical and sexual abuse in former industrial schools run by the order.

A Catholic bishop from the war-torn Darfur region in Africa is visiting Ireland this week to raise awareness of the plight of his people.