IRELAND
Irish Times
Mary Carolan
Two women who claim they were forced, while attending industrial schools, to work in Magdalene laundries have alleged unreasonable exclusion from a State compensation scheme.
Due to their exclusion on a “technicality” from the scheme concerning the laundries, the women view the Taoiseach’s apology over the treatment of those who worked in them as “hollow”, counsel Michael Lynn SC said.
They are suing the Minister for Justice in proceedings that opened in the High Court on Wednesday before Mr Justice Michael White.
The women claim that while attending industrial schools run by religious orders in the 1970s and 1980s, they were forced to work in Magdalene laundries which, they allege, were linked to those schools.
One of the women was aged just two when she was taken from her family for reasons unknown to her and placed in a school. She was then sent to work in a laundry for periods, the court heard.
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