Anger at mother and baby home redress scheme as survivors may walk away from inquiry

Sunday World

4 days ago

'It's a disgrace. It compounds the second and third-class status. This is the way it felt on the announcement of that bill. It's almost like we should be grateful.'
The shrine dedicated to the children who lost their lives in the Bon Secours Mother and Baby home. Photo:Mother and baby home survivors may walk away from the public inquiry after thousands were excluded from the redress scheme, says a leading campaigner.
Mark McCollum, whose mum was sent to the Magdalene laundry in Newry, says plans in a new Stormont bill announced on Monday to refuse compensation to the families of victims who died before 2011 has shaken confidence in the entire process.
The campaigner says Stormont should be pursuing the Catholic Church for money as the redress decision is entirely financial.
In wake of a dark week for victims of the institutions on both sides of the border, operations have begun in Tuam, Co Galway to exhume and identify the remains of nearly 800 babies and toddlers buried in the sewage system of the former St Mary's home, run by an order of Catholic nuns from 1925 to 1961.
Mark McCollum.
Mark, who was taken by a social worker from Newry to Donegal at just a few weeks old in 1966 before being adopted, knows individuals desperately hoping the Tuam excavation will return the remains of their siblings.
'I've met some of the guys down there over the last few years and one of them told me 'my sister's in there. That could have been me',' he says.
'It seems to be one of the weeks where you're hearing a lot about this and you think 'there but for the grace of God go I'. Any of us could have ended up in that place.
'It's a disgrace. It compounds the second and third-class status. This is the way it felt on the announcement of that bill. It's almost like we should be grateful.'
A 2021 report by Queen's University revealed that more than 10,000 pregnant women and girls were sent to mother and baby homes in Northern Ireland between 1922 and 1990 because they were unmarried. A third were under 19 and the youngest was 12. They endured harsh conditions, and in the three Magdalene laundries often had to work right up until giving birth, and were then pressured into giving up their children.
Following a truth recovery process the Assembly introduced a bill on Monday to set up a public inquiry and a redress scheme, but in a blow to families it has imposed a random date for compensation.
The shrine dedicated to the children who lost their lives in the Bon Secours Mother and Baby home. Photo:Today's News in 90 Seconds - July 4th
It proposes a payment of £10,000 to eligible survivors and £2,000 to family members of deceased victims, but only if the death occurred on or after September 29 2011.
'We have all been involved in this for the last few years, contributing our experience and we felt this is different, people are listening to us, and all of a sudden it was a slap in the face,' says Mark
'It should go back to the foundation of the state in 1922, that's when the institutions were being set up, that's when the girls started going to these places, and everyone should get recognition, not just an arbitrary date.'
His birth mother Kathleen McGuire was just 20 when she was sent to Marianvale, and gave birth in Daisy Hill Hospital in Newry. Mark believes his removal across the border to Nazareth House in Fahan in Donegal by a social worker was also highly questionable.
His attempts to find Kathleen were thwarted, and he later found out she had been desperately seeking for him, unsuccessfully because his name had been changed.
In 2020 he discovered her identity, and was devastated to learn Kathleen, who spoke to neighbours in England about the son she'd had taken from her, had died in 2000, aged 54. In the same week in 2020 his adoptive mother also died.
Kathleen McGuire
The dad of two, a retired academic and social justice advocate, believes the redress cut-off date is a cost-saving exercise.
'I could make a claim in my own right but not on behalf of my mum. My daughters couldn't make one on behalf of their granny.
'It's really complicated and very confusing. We thought things could have been and should have been a lot more straightforward and clean cut.
'For a lot of women and a lot of their adoptive children it's too late. A significant number of the women have passed away.
'Time is a luxury a lot of people don't have in this process. It's just frustrating when you have an opportunity to draft a bill, that whoever drafted the bill didn't listen.'
He says it's a real concern now that survivors who could be part of the public inquiry have lost faith in the process.
When they were informed of the legislation over a Zoom meeting hosted by First Minister Michelle O'Neill earlier this week, there was a stunned silence.
'At the meeting on Monday there were people saying 'I'm not part of this process anymore, I'm walking away',' says Mark.
'Some of the workhouses are also a grey area, whether they're in or they're out, and there shouldn't be grey areas.
'We have spent three years contributing to this process, crafting this legislation and it was red-penned.'
He says the silence from the Catholic Church has been deafening.
'There is nothing coming from the Catholic Church or the orders who ran these institutions.
'The state has their responsibility but the church does as well and they're getting off the hook. They have gone to ground hoping it will go away.
'They haven't acknowledged and they haven't apologised,' says Mark.