Following the closure of the Historical Institutional Abuse Redress Scheme for victims and survivors on 2 April 2025, Commissioner Fiona Ryan said:
First and foremost, I want to acknowledge the strength and courage of all survivors of non-recent/historical institutional child abuse, including those who chose to share their experiences as children in institutions during the process of applying for redress compensation. As an Office we have sought to engage as many victims and survivors as possible and have carried out awareness raising initiatives in Northern Ireland and Britain to reach victims and survivors who might be unsure or unaware of their entitlements.
My Office has supported 1182 individual victims and survivors since we first opened in December 2020. Many victims and survivors shared their experiences with us in the context of accessing information on redress compensation and how to apply. It has been a privilege to support victims and survivors in this way and we as a team are grateful for the opportunity. We would also like to thank colleagues whom we worked with to ensure victims and survivors received the necessary supports they needed to apply for financial redress compensation.
I am conscious that many victims and survivors have passed, many before their time, many of whom never even had the opportunity to apply for redress or receive supports, their lives and too often their deaths, shaped by their experiences of being abused as children in institutions in Northern Ireland. I am conscious that there may well be survivors who are unaware of the financial redress scheme and specialist dedicated supports and others still who made the decision not to apply for financial redress compensation.
It is important then to underline that even as the financial redress scheme closed for applications on 2 April 2025, services and supports will remain for victims and survivors including those supports offered by the Victims and Survivors Service (VSS). Services and supports are available to victims and survivors of Northern Ireland historical institutional child abuse whether they reside here or elsewhere or whether they applied for redress or not.
We look forward to continuing to advocate for ongoing supports and services for all victims and survivors and connecting them with services if they choose. As part of these ongoing advocacy efforts, in the coming months we will provide the results of our consultation with victims and survivors on services and use this as a basis to engage with services around supports to victims and survivors.