I welcome the opportunity to speak on this today. In doing so, I recognise the role women have played in bringing about revolutionary change in this country. Indeed, they have been to the forefront of it on many occasions, including the fight for independence, the right to vote, social changes, workers' rights, trade union rights, economic changes and in every area of politics. In recent decades women have fought in the campaigns for divorce, contraception and gender equality. We need to acknowledge the cruel manner in which girls and young women were treated in Ireland, particularly in industrial schools in decades gone by, and in the Magdalen laundries. What happened to them was nothing short of inhuman and we must never allow ourselves to go back to a situation like that again. Most of those institutions were run by Catholic religious orders, which is an issue for the Catholic church, and I say that as a Catholic. However, what is often conveniently ignored by sections of the media, in particular The Irish Times, is that some were Protestant-run - the Bethany Home, for example. The children in those homes suffered a cruel fate and abuse, which has been deliberately ignored and suppressed by the media. All attempts to highlight it by those campaigners, who have tried to campaign for the victims of the Protestant-run schools, have been ignored and censored over the years. You would have to ask why. Everything needs to be brought out into the daylight. We need to deal with all the matters of the past and move on from them. While great progress has been made on many issues, there is still a lot of fundamental change that is required. In the area of domestic abuse, which is mainly against women, Laois still does not have a domestic abuse refuge. Laois domestic violence services in Portlaoise provide an excellent service for people but there is a need for that to be addressed. In regard to online abuse, we had the case two weeks ago of the awful abuse of a young woman in University College Dublin, UCD, who was allegedly raped, drugged and photographed. The photographs and vile abuse about her circulated throughout the school. The area of childcare needs to be addressed. Working-class women in particular face financial hardship and issues around access to help so there is still work to be done. While we can clap ourselves on the back, there is a lot more to be done before we can really do it.

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