With the announcement of the terms of reference for the Commission of Investigation into ‘Mother and Baby’ homes due very shortly, there is deep concern among survivors, that the remit will be much too narrow.

At the age that most children start primary school, Andrew Begley was sent to work on a farm in the North.

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.

Given that the Government has committed to consulting a wide range of opinion regarding the scope of the Commission of Investigation into mother-and-baby homes, I would like to issue a plea that the foremost issue to be decided should be which institutions are included.

WILL there be truth now, or will we go on hiding?

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.

As a former orphan I welcome the children’s rights referendum.

THE boy’s shoe laces were tied together.”

Diarmuid Martin is to be congratulated for his recent remarks that there is “no way” the abuse of thousands of children within the Irish church can be swept under the rug. Would that such moral courage and leadership was replicated by those who have responsibility to account for the treatment of children who were placed in Protestant institutions such as Bethany Dublin, and Westbank Greystones.

WE put on our hats on a Sunday morning and march off to church with faith in our hearts and smiles on our faces.

We welcome moves to include Westbank Orphanage, Greystones, in inquiries into institutional abuse in Northern Ireland.

A major security operation is under way in Northern Ireland today as thousands of Orangemen take to the streets for the Battle of the Boyne commemoration parades.

Northern Ireland Chief Constable Hugh Orde tonight appealed for peace on the streets of Belfast ahead of a tense Orange Order parade through the city.