Opposition brands Kenny a disgrace for failing to apologise

The Taoiseach was branded a “disgrace” by Sinn Féin’s Mary Lou McDonald for his failure to apologise to the residents of Magdalene Laundries “and for the State’s role in their incarceration in these brutal institutions”.

A Dáil debate on yesterday’s 1,000-page report on the institutions has been promised in a fortnight and the opposition parties plan to pile the pressure on the Government to come to it with an apology and a promise of compensation for the victims.

Ms McDonald said the report establishes “direct State involvement” in the operations of 10 laundries by four religious orders — the last of which closed in the 1990s.