DUP pledges to take Institutional abuse fight to Westminster
Arlene Foster and Nigel Dodds met with victims on Monday
Last updated 27th Jul 2018
The DUP has agreed to urge the UK government to speed up new legislation to help victims of institutional abuse here.
Arlene Foster and Nigel Dodds met with campaigners on Monday and said they would raise the matter with the Secretary of State, the head of the civil service and the chief constable.
Following the meeting, Arlene Foster said the party would address the matter in Westminster:
"The victims and survivors of historical institutional abuse deserve to see progress following Sir Anthony Hart’s report in 2017.
"We heard their views first hand today.
"With the historical nature of these cases and time passing, the needs of the victims must be addressed.
"The scale of failure to protect our most vulnerable children is astonishing.
"The pain and suffering inflicted upon these victims represents a complete failure by the entire system.
"Children and young people were placed in homes with a certainty that they would be nurtured and cared for instead that trust was betrayed.
"The absence of an Executive has placed a hurdle in the way of making progress for victims.
"We have been pressing the Government to put a decision-making structure in place to deal with issues around schools and hospitals as well as historical abuse victims.
"Following this meeting, Nigel and I will be speaking with the Secretary of State, the Head of the Civil Service as well as the Chief Constable. It is important that in the absence of devolution, these victims are not forgotten."
Margaret McGuckin was just three when she went into Nazareth House residential home on the Ormeau Road.
"I can remember as a very young child at the age of three.
"Unfortunately the welfare had to take us in because my mother had left and that was just such a dark place.
"You'd never have seen a flower there, you'd never have seen sunlight hardly."
Margaret suffered 'systemic abuse' at the hands of nuns and says she wants victims to have access to suitable support services here:
"I remember in the baby unit being shouted at, howled at, pushed about.
"I can remember crying and crying and to this day I hate to hear babies crying, there's something deep in my psyche that I want to go and hold those children because your cries were never heard or attended to."
Margaret set up the group SAVIA and campaiged for a pubic inquiry into abuse of children in residential homes here.
Led by Sir Anthony Hart, the report in 2017 made a number of recommendations but with no Executive, none have been implemented.
Margaret says victims need a bespoke care package to help heal the wounds of the past:
"They (the nuns) didn't want us there, they didn't want to be there themselves.
"So they'd have hit you with brooms, canes, anything that was in their hand, big bunches of keys, leather straps that they'd have had tied round their waist.
" Sir Anthony Harte has told the world that we suffered severe, systemic abuse, cruelty and neglect which has obviously damaged you and that's why this care package is so important.
"That's a big thing, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
"I suffer from that myself and panic attacks and anxiety and depression and a lot of our people, memories of that childhood will never go away, they live it every day of the week.
"That's what we need, specific counsellors in post traumatic stress disorder."