These are the words of Mary Dunlevy Greene, one of the hunger strikers who fought for redress from the Government for the State's part in their abuse: We were child slaves. We got very little portions of food. We were deprived of every human right. A capitation grant was paid by the State to the religious orders to keep us there. They gagged us. We weren't allowed to speak afterwards or name an institution or a perpetrator. The horrors cannot be overstated. I remember going out to meet with them when they were bravely on their hunger strike, not seeing any road in terms of justice and just the horror these people went through for which the State was responsible. Therefore, it is welcome that the State has given an apology but it has to be followed by action. We cannot forget how long it took to get to this point, not just in years but in terms of the 46 days of the hunger strike it took for a mediator to be put in place and the 51 days for the Government to commit to work with the hunger strikers regarding their very simple demands. These were the award of a Health (Amendment) Act card and a State contributory pension for the abuse that they suffered in their childhood, in line - this is the point they always made - with what had been offered to other survivors of similar institutions. It is good that the Government has announced supports for survivors. It has been a very long process and they are not all in place but they need to be put in place. If they are not, we will be putting very significant pressure on in here to make sure that they are and that survivors are not forced to contact us to say that they keep hearing that things are going to be resolved but things do not seem to be resolved. There are around 4,000 living survivors of abuse in industrial schools. They cannot be made to wait. They have to get this. It is the very least that they are entitled to. I also want to raise a related issue of abuse that has been ignored. This is the historic abuse that occurred in psychiatric hospitals. I have been speaking to Mary Donovan about her mother Margaret Mary Donovan, who was institutionalised for nearly her entire life. She spent over 50 years in both State-run and religious institutions across Ireland from the age of 16. In 1966, nursing notes said there appeared to be very little wrong mentally with her, yet she remained institutionalised. Included in the allegations against these psychiatric institutions are mistreatment, rape and forced labour. The abuse also severely impacted the life of Mary's brother Christopher, who spent over 20 years in a psychiatric hospital and died there in 2007. The abuse he suffered saw him go from what was described as a big man to a skeleton and develop numerous other issues, including schizophrenia. There is no inquiry in place regarding psychiatric institutions and no redress or apology has been offered. This issue is coming and the Government should get ahead of it, address it, order an inquiry into it and not force another group of people to have to protest for a basic recognition of the wrongs the State did to them and an apology.

Sentiment score: -0.25