Kenny: Treatment of many women in mother and baby homes 'an abomination'

The Taoiseach has described the treatment of women and children in mother-and-baby homes as "an abomination".

Enda Kenny was speaking as the Government announced a Commission of Inquiry into conditions at the homes.

The Taoiseach said if the issue was not properly handled, Ireland's soul would itself lie in an unmarked grave.

And he told the Dáil that the Ireland of today had to come to terms with what he called its "not-so-glorious past".

"There was an extraordinary time when the women of Ireland, and poor women especially, were held up to a particulraly high and callous account," he said.

"It's not an exaggeration to say their treatment in many cases, and that of their babies, was an abomination."