State has to say sorry and offer redress

A few things that need to be put to bed about the McAleese Report and the Taoiseach’s refusal to issue an apology to the women incarcerated in the Magdalene Laundries.

Despite the rhetoric and hand-wringing about “absorbing” and “reflecting” on the contents of the 1,000-page report, Enda Kenny’s blatant refusal to issue an apology is not about saying sorry. It’s about a far more grubby issue with which it is preoccupied — money.

From the day in 2009 when then education minister Batt O’Keeffe categorically stated that the State had no role in committing women to Magdalene Laundries, both the last government and the current administration have been running from the issue.