I’m going to be a voice for these children

Chris Page, the BBC’s Ireland correspondent speaks to the Irish historian Catherine Corless, who has changed history in her own country.

When she began to research a long-closed mother and baby home near where she lived, she encountered local resistance. But her dogged investigation led to the discovery that hundreds of babies and young children were buried in mass, unmarked graves inside a disused sewage tank at the site in Tuam, Ireland.

Her work led to the discovery of the scandal of Ireland’s historical mother and baby institutions, which housed unmarried mothers and their babies at a time when they were ostracized by Irish society and often their families too. An inquiry launched by the Irish government into the network of homes concluded about nine thousand children died in the eighteen homes investigated.

The revelation led to apologies from the Catholic Church in Ireland, the Irish Government, the council which owned the home in Tuam and the religious order which ran the home. The order has also contributed millions of dollars to a compensation scheme, and to the excavation now underway in Tuam.

Thank you to Chris Page and Chrissie McGlinchey from the BBC’s Ireland bureau for their help in making this programme.

Presenter: Chris Page

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(Image: Catherine Corless. Credit: PA)