NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph
Victims abused in church, voluntary and state-run children’s homes in Northern Ireland should be offered interim compensation payments before a long-running inquiry in to the crimes is completed, campaigners have urged.
Many former residents of institutions where abuse was committed are now old and cannot wait until the Historical Abuse Inquiry (HIA) finishes hearing evidence and produces an official report to Stormont, charity Survivors and Victims of Institutional Abuse (SAVIA) warned.
Retired judge Sir Anthony Hart is leading the HIA probe, one of the UK’s largest inquiries into physical, sexual and emotional harm to children at homes run by the church, state and voluntary organisations.
The inquiry was formally established in January 2013 by the Northern Ireland Executive to investigate child abuse which occurred in residential institutions over a 73-year period from 1922 to 1995.
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