IRELAND
Irish Times

STEPHEN COLLINS and HARRY McGEE

The Government will seek a “clear strategy and a clear plan” as to how best to deal with the findings of the report into the Magdalene laundries, Taoiseach Enda Kenny has said.

The Government came under renewed criticism today following the refusal of Mr Kenny to issue a full apology to the women who spent time in the laundries, despite the fact that more than a quarter were sent there by the State.

The ‘Report of the Inter-Departmental Committee to establish the facts of State involvement with the Magdalen Laundries’ was published yesterday by an interdepartmental committee chaired by Martin McAleese found the women were from many backgrounds.

Some were referred by courts, others released on licence from industrial schools before they reached 16 years of age, while some were young women over 16 years of age who had been…