Mother & Baby Homes: €800m redress scheme for 34,000 survivors announced

The scheme, which will include an enhanced medical card and two types of financial payment, will not open until late next year

While all mothers who spent time in a Mother and Baby Institution will be eligible for a payment regardless of the length of residency, children will have to have spent six months or more in an institution to qualify. File photo: Laura Hutton/RollingNews.ie

Some 34,000 survivors of mother and baby homes are to receive payments under a new €800m redress scheme.

Announcing the redress scheme, after it was approved by Cabinet, Children's Minister Roderic O'Gorman said: “There is no payment or measure that can ever fully compensate or atone for the harm done.”

The scheme, which will include an enhanced medical card, will not open until late next year.

Mr O'Gorman said the applications of elderly survivors will be expedited, however, legislation will have to be introduced before the scheme can open.

The payments will be based on the length of time women and children spent in mother and baby homes and county homes.

There will be two types of financial payment:

• A general payment to recognise time spent in the institution, harsh conditions, emotional abuse and other forms of mistreatment, stigma and trauma experienced while resident in a Mother and Baby or County Home Institution.
• A work-related payment for women who were resident in certain institutions for more than three months and who undertook what might be termed commercial work.

While all mothers who spent time in a Mother and Baby Institution will be eligible for a payment regardless of the length of residency, children will have to have spent six months or more in an institution to qualify, and they cannot have received redress for that institution under the Residential Institutions Redress Scheme (RIRS).

Mr O'Gorman added that those who avail of the scheme will not be gagged, however, they will be obliged to sign a legal waiver stating that they will not pursue further legal action against State.

"What we have set out today is the next chapter in the State’s response to the legacy of those institutions, and its commitment to rebuilding the trust it so grievously shattered," Mr O'Gorman said.