'We have been through worse in the industrial schools': Survivors vow to continue 46-day hunger strike

From left: Mary Dunlevy Green from Limerick, aged 73; Miriam Moriarty Owens from Tralee, 68; Mary Donovan from Kerry, 57; and Maurice Patton O'Connell from Kerry, 57, outside Leinster House in Dublin. Picture: Leah Farrell / RollingNews.ie

"We have been through worse in the industrial schools."

Those are the words of a former industrial school survivor on hunger strike at the Dáil with three others, over what they say are State failures to implement their entitlements from the redress scheme.

Kerry natives Miriam Moriarty Owens, Mary Donavan, Maurice Patton O’Connell, and Limerick woman Mary Dunlevy Greene have been living rough and protesting for the past 46 days by refusing to eat, claiming they are surviving only on coffee and water.

They are insisting they are entitled to a Health Amendment Act (HAA) card and a contributory pension, which they say were promised by the Government but have not been delivered as part of the industrial schools' redress scheme.

HAA cards are for people who contracted hepatitis C from blood products in the State. They provide free services such as GP visits, prescriptions, dentistry, hospital stays, and counselling.

The group met with the Taoiseach last Wednesday at Government buildings and were due to meet a negotiator on Monday, which was delayed until today.

Ms Moriarty Owens, who is is 68, said she hoped the situation could be resolved, claiming each striker's weight has dropped by at least 20kg. Medics observing said they are now in a ketogenic state, where their bodies are eating into their fat reserves.

“It should not have come to this," Ms Moriarty Owens told the Irish Examiner. “We are a strong group nothing will break us. I was in the Pembroke Arms Industrial School in Tralee from a baby to 13 years.

We were demoralised, stripped naked and lay facing down and beaten by the nuns, who enjoyed the torture.

“We are doing it for the 4,000 others. We are a good strong unit holding each other up. All we want is our entitlements.” 

The group has received much support online, they said.

She explained the "hell" that she and thousands of other young children suffered during the industrial school era when they were detained by the courts and sentenced to the care of the nuns until they were 16, including her sisters Joan and Áine, who have since died.

“I came to Pembroke Arms Industrial school in Tralee as a baby and left when I was 13,” she said, adding she relives time in the school “every single day”. 

“As soon as we moved in there, it was the most horrific thing, from the cruelty to the most sadistic place you can imagine. Once you entered those doors, your life changed forever. They stripped us of our names, our dignity and voice."

Her freedom came when her previously ill mother recovered and began to fight to get her children out of the institutions.

The Irish Examiner has seen the court order for Ms Moriarty Owens, which confirms she was detained in Pembroke House and the family had no choice, given her mother’s sickness.

She said the hunger strike would continue until their demands are met by Government.

“We have been through worse. We are strong people and the four of us together we are a unit and we have a great bond. We can get through this because we know what hell is, we were sent there through no fault of our own as children.”