Survivors have been left weary by ‘meaningless’ State apologies

:: Weariness has grown as State responses lose their meaning

SORRY. Sorry for failing to intervene. Sorry for not listening. Sorry for not believing you.

We have heard these words before. The survivors have heard these words before. Only the faces are different. Bertie, Brian, Enda, Leo. And now, Micheál.

Formal State apologies used to mean something. But the survivors have grown weary. One described it as: “The most shallow, contrived apology I have ever heard.”

However, historian Catherine Corless, who helped expose the dark history of the mother and baby homes, welcomed an apology from the Bon Secours order which ran the notorious Tuam home.

“It’s good to have an apology and an acknowledgement from them that they are responsible. It’s a huge step,” she told the Irish Independent.

SORRY. Sorry for failing to intervene. Sorry for not listening. Sorry for not believing you. We have heard these words before. The survivors have heard these words before. Only the faces are different. Bertie, Brian, Enda, Leo. And now, Micheál.

Formal State apologies used to mean something. But the survivors have grown weary. Words are only words, after all. How can they be sure that this time things will be different and that instead of the usual empty promises, will come positive action, openness and a genuine will to put things right?

The truth is, they cannot be sure. Survivors had warned the authorities against making an apology ‘too soon’ after Tuesday’s publication of the final report of the mother and baby homes, fearing that it might be knee-jerk and meaningless. They wanted time to digest the information contained in its 3,000 pages.

Terri Harrison, who gave birth to a son she called Niall in the St Patrick’s institution in Dublin in 1973 when she was 18 years old, was watching on TV as the Taoiseach stood up in the Convention Centre to deliver this latest version of the State apology. And she described it as “devastating”.

“The most shallow, contrived apology I have ever heard,” she said. “They’ve washed their hands of us but their hands will be dirty forever. They’ll never wash the stains away.”

She spoke of a friend, another survivor in her 80s, who “wants to die knowing that she did nothing wrong” and whose television broke on the day the report was out and so was unable to follow the coverage of its contents.

“She was on the phone to me with elation in her voice, ‘It’s out isn’t it? Now they’ll believe us, won’t they?’ and I said, ‘Of course they will.’ I couldn’t break it to her,” said Terri quietly.

“We lived it but they’re dismissing us entirely. Nobody is really interested in the cruelty and the lack of any form of care. It’s like it didn’t happen and the focus is on society and the parents who put them in there.”

The apology did not come in time for the one o’clock news, as anticipated. Instead, it overran, with Leaders Questions about the fishing industry and the impact the Covid payment might have on the student grant.

Ordinarily the Dáil would be packed for such a State apology, but in Covid times there were swathes of empty seats and the backdrop of the National Convention Centre made it look more like a courtroom than a parliament.

“It is the duty of a republic to be willing to hold itself to account. To be willing to confront hard truths – and accept parts of our history which are deeply uncomfortable,” the Taoiseach began.

This is a moment for us as a society to recognise “a profound failure of empathy, understanding and basic humanity over a very lengthy period”, he said.

He went on to say that the treatment of women and children is something which was the direct result of how the State “and we as a society acted”.

“We honoured piety, but failed to show even basic kindness to those who needed it most.

“We had a completely warped attitude to sexuality and intimacy, and young mothers and their sons and daughters were forced to pay a terrible price for that dysfunction.

“To confront the dark and shameful reality which is detailed in this report, we must acknowledge it as part of our national history,” he said.

“And for the women and children who were treated so cruelly we must do what we can, to show our deep remorse, understanding and support.”

He then declared: “On behalf of the Government, the State and its citizens, I apologise for the profound generational wrong visited upon Irish mothers and their children who ended up in a mother and baby home or a county home.

He apologised for the “shame and stigma” which they were subjected to and which, for some, remains a burden to this day.

“In apologising, I want to emphasise that each of you were in an institution because of the wrongs of others. Each of you is blameless, each of you did nothing wrong and has nothing to be ashamed of.

“Each of you deserved so much better,” he stressed.

At her home in Tuam, Catherine Corless was watching, too.

“We’ve had apology after apology before and promising this, that and the other and what comes of them?” One apology that came, however, did make a big impact on her and that was the one from the Bon Secours Nuns, who had run the home at Tuam.

“I was shocked but delighted,” she said. “For the last two years I couldn’t get any response from them if I asked for records. But they took the onus on themselves about the uncharitable way they treated the women and children, and especially for the way the babies were buried in such an indecent way.”

The political words, she dismissed as “waffle”. “A lot of it goes over our heads instead of standing up and saying it out straight.”

‘They’ve washed their hands of us but their hands will be dirty forever’