Mother and Baby Institutions Payment Scheme: Capital Disregard

Rachel Hopkins Excerpts

Tuesday 10th June 2025 Westminster Hall

[Rachel Hopkins (Luton South and South Bedfordshire) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Jardine. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham and Penge (Liam Conlon) for securing today’s debate and congratulate him on bringing forward a ten-minute rule Bill on Philomena’s law. I am proud to put my name to that Bill as a co-sponsor, particularly as I represent a significant Irish diaspora in my constituency, with close ties between the UK and Ireland. I hope the Minister understands the importance of those ties.

As has already been outlined, Philomena’s law is named after Philomena Lee, who was 18 when she became pregnant and was sent to the Sean Ross Abbey mother and baby home in Roscrea, County Tipperary, where she gave birth to her son Anthony and lived for three years before being forced to give him up for adoption. We have heard about the Oscar-nominated film “Philomena”, which told the story of her painstaking search to be reunited with Anthony.

Philomena’s story sadly struck a chord for thousands of mothers and their children who not only suffered in those cruel institutions, but were ever changed by the lasting mark it made on their lives. With great thanks to Luton Irish Forum, which does brilliant work supporting our Irish diaspora, I am honoured to share a snippet of the story of my constituent, Christina, who is here today. She has been really courageous in sharing her story and allowing me to mention her in my speech.

Christina was born in a mother and baby home in Rathdrum, County Wicklow. Christina’s mother escaped and ran away with her just weeks after her birth, but subsequently left Christina on the doorstep of a church in Dublin. Christina spent much of her life being passed from foster family to foster family, where she experienced physical abuse, taunting and humiliation, including from those caring for her and neighbours on the street where she lived. She eventually reconnected with her mother during her teenage years, after hiring a detective to track her down, and realised that she was living in Dublin, just minutes from where Christina was working in a factory.

Unfortunately Christina and her mother never forged a close relationship, but it is important to ensure that these stories are heard, because the trauma Christina endured and the shame associated with mother and baby institutions in Ireland unfortunately mirrors the story of tens of thousands of women and children who experienced harsh conditions and mistreatment, with many fleeing to England to escape. It is right that the Irish Government opened the mother and baby institutions payment scheme for survivors of mother and baby homes in March 2024 to recognise the impact of the time they spent in those institutions. However, for those now living in England, further hurdles remain and are preventing those eligible for the scheme from accessing the compensation they are entitled to.

Survivors who accept an offer of payment from the scheme could lose a range of means-tested benefits, including housing benefit, pension credit and financial support for social care, as the payment would be treated as savings. This complicated and unfair situation has made the payments scheme, which was supposed to be a token of apology from the Irish Government, into an additional burden and hurdle for many. The uncertainty and stress involved is causing yet more trauma for survivors, and many eligible applicants have delayed accepting the money they have been offered or not made applications in the first place as a result.

Sadly, the age profile of many eligible applicants means that delays in accepting offers or making applications run the risk that many people will not live long enough to benefit from the compensation that they are due. I support my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham and Penge in his efforts to implement Philomena’s law, which would put right this unfair situation through the introduction of an indefinite capital disregard and would ringfence any compensation accepted through the scheme so that it would not impact benefits or social care calculations.

[Lola McEvoy]

I thank my hon. Friend for her eloquent articulation of Christina’s story. Does she agree that the capital disregard functionality could be extended to future compensation schemes? Instead of each campaign group going through the trauma of trying to get an exemption for people on means-tested benefits, it could be stipulated that, when a compensation scheme is deemed to come into law, the capital disregard is automatically part of it.

[Rachel Hopkins]

I thank my hon. Friend for making a hugely pertinent point; I know the Minister will have heard it very well.

Although compensation for survivors will not reverse the damage and trauma inflicted, the least we can do is to ensure that those who are eligible get the payments they deserve, that the process is as easy and stress-free as possible and that we provide them with the kindness and respect that they have too often been denied.