Miriam Moriarty Owens, Mary Donovan, Mary Dunlevy Greene and Maurice Patton O'Connell are four courageous survivors of abuse in industrial schools who undertook a hunger strike for 51 days outside this very building. They did not do that lightly. They did it as a last act, a last resort. These survivors, who had already been failed in childhood by the State and religious authorities, felt compelled to place their own health at risk simply to have their voices heard, and all for very modest demands, including a HAA card so they can access medical care without additional financial hardship and a contributory State pension acknowledging the years of their unpaid labour carried out in the institutions. Government after Government acknowledged wrongs but failed to implement fully comprehensive survivor-centred redress. In reality, the Supports for Survivors of Residential Institutional Abuse Act 2025 was a half-measure that ignored the unmet need of all survivors. Sinn Féin brought forward amendments at the time seeking to make that Act equal for all survivors of residential institutions but all of our amendments were struck down by Government. The 2025 Act failed to guarantee universal access to that HAA card; did not provide a contributory State pension in recognition of that unpaid institutional labour; created eligibility thresholds that excluded survivors based on technicalities; and introduced layers of bureaucracy that placed undue burden again on survivors to prove their suffering. A survivor-centred scheme would have ensured the universal inclusion for survivors regardless of what institution they were in or the institution's religious ethos. That was not survivor-centred; it was bureaucracy-centred. It created a hierarchy of pain based on arbitrary lines. Survivors of institutional abuse were failed as children by religious orders and by the State - by the very systems that were meant to protect them - and they carried the consequences of that for a lifetime. Enduring trauma, an indelible mark was put upon them by those in authority and they were criminalised. The State now has an opportunity and an obligation to move beyond symbolism and deliver concrete, equitable, survivor-centred supports and a timeline for the delivery of them. All commitments must be delivered. Justice must be delivered but an apology has to be the beginning not the end because an apology without justice is hollow and empty and those four people sitting in the Gallery today and all the others like them deserve so much more than that.

Sentiment score: -0.20