Mother and baby home survivor urges Bill to pass so there are ‘no more delays’

Bessborough mother and baby institution survivor Alice Coughlan (Oireachtas TV screengrab/PA)

More women will die without knowing whether their child is “rotting in the ground or in a septic tank” unless legislation is passed to allow the excavation of unmarked graves in all Irish institutions, a survivor of one mother and baby home has said.

Alice Coughlan, a survivor of the Bessborough institution, described the Government’s Burials Bill as “divisive” and said she does not support it wholeheartedly, but that it needs to be passed so there can be “no more delays”.