Victims of Institutional Abuse "Should Be Compensated"

BBC News
October 21, 2015

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34603553

Victims of institutional abuse in Northern Ireland should be compensated now, say campaigners.

It is three years since the Historical Institutional Abuse inquiry was set up to consider allegations dating back to 1922.

Such is the scale of its task, however, that its final report is not expected until next year at the earliest.

With the inquiry examining cases stretching back over decades, many of those affected are now elderly.

Some abuse victims have died without receiving any compensation or form of recognition.

Time running out

Margaret McGuckin of the charity Survivors and Victims of Institutional Abuse (SAVIA) warned on Thursday that time is running out for other survivors.

Speaking at the inquiry in Banbridge, she said: "We stand together, united as one in asking our government to make an immediate commitment in agreeing to the setting up of proposals to begin the start of an interim redress scheme for those children, now adults, who were put into the care of church and state-run institutions."

Her concern was echoed by fellow group member Martin Adams, who will give evidence to the inquiry on Thursday afternoon.

He alleges he was abused in the government-run Rathgael Training School.

Although it was the Ryan report into abuse within the Catholic Church which originally led to the establishment of the inquiry, Mr Adams is one of a growing number of witnesses who say they were abused in institutions with no connection to religious organisations.

In a statement, Mr Adams said: "No longer can the government, or those who were in charge of abuse victims at the time, deny that these abuses happened."

They say they have no wish to pre-empt the findings of the inquiry but claim the evidence up to now has been "damning".