In a 2011 submission to the U.N Committee Against Torture, Justice for Magdalenes highlighted the dire situation in which many of the survivors still find themselves, years later.

"Their poverty has been exacerbated throughout their lives by the denial of educational opportunity which they suffered while incarcerated in the laundries, as well as the psychological and physical injury caused by the abuse," it said.

"Nor have the women received healthcare or education to assist them in overcoming their trauma and abuse.

"There is a dearth of personal records of the women, and they continue to feel constrained and silenced by a deep sense of stigma and shame over their incarceration in the Magdalene Laundries, because of the continued denial of justice, lack of inquiry, and lack of acknowledgment that they were not at fault for what they suffered but instead had a grave abuse perpetrated upon them."

The lack of personal records has also made it difficult for the adopted children of those locked up in the laundries to trace their mothers.

The last of the Magdalen Laundries closed in 1996.

An act passed in 2002 addressed abuse and neglect suffered by thousands of Irish children in state-licensed residential homes and schools, but omitted those who'd suffered in the Magdalen Laundries.