The Department of Justice is calculating payments for the newly expanded Magdalene redress scheme on the basis that “no child under the age of 12 years of age worked in a Magdalene Laundry” unless it can be proven otherwise.

Tuam babies campaigner Catherine Corless has hit out at the Government for focusing “on cost” rather than committing to a full forensic excavation, exhumation, and DNA testing of the remains at the Tuam site.

An academic who had access to one diocesan archive reports accounts of physical abuse and medical neglect and argues that the files are not accurately reflected in the McAleese Report into the Laundries, writes Conall Ó Fátharta.

The McAleese inquiry into Magdalene laundries was informed in 2012 about “disturbing” infant death rates in excess of 50% at the Tuam Mother and Baby Home.