Taoiseach Enda Kenny has been meeting British prime minister David Cameron at 10 Downing Street for the first formal bilateral meeting since the Conservatives were returned to power in May.
Both leaders have been discussing economic issues and the current situation in Northern Ireland, included what are described as “legacy issues”.
It is also likely that the critical situation in Greece will be discussed by both leaders during the meeting over lunch, which got underway at about 12.45pm.
They are expected to give a joint press conference later on Thursday afternoon.
Earlier Mr Kenny visited the Irish Women Survivors Support Network office in Kentish town, where he met about survivors of the Magdalen Laundries, some for the first time since he issued a formal State apology to the women in an emotional speech in the Dáil in 2012
The ‘Whispering Hope’ project has helped British-based survivors, 76 in all which use its services, benefit from the restorative justice and recompense scheme that was put in place by the Government.
The driving forces behind the campaign for 15 years have been Cllr Sally Mulready and Phyllis Morgan. Ms Mulready said the project has been highly successful and many of the women were now at a stage where they wanted to move forward.
“They owe it to their children and grandchildren to move forward. The focus is on reconciliation and - it’s an old-fashioned word but an important one - forgiveness.”
She said Mr Kenny’s apology to the Dáil had removed the stigma that had been carried by many of the Magdalen survivors.
Talking to the group Mr Kenny said that many spoke of the apology allowing them to reclaim their heritage and their country. But he said that the kindness of the women and their experiences had been a powerful force in redeeming and restoring the State, making it a better place.
Referring to his four-hour meeting with the women in the Irish embassy in London at the time, he referred in particular to the women singing the song ‘Whispering Hope’ to him.
“I have to say to those that one of the most powerful impacts in my career in politics has been when I met with you that day [and]the singing of ‘Whispering Hope’… It has become the anthem of the Magdalen women.”
Mary Currington, who was brought up in orphanage and was then sent into a Magdalen Laundry in Cork at the age of 18 said: “Our stories were too long inside of us. A lot of people in Ireland shut their ears about what happened behind those high walls.”
She said all that had changed when Mr Kenny apologised on behalf of the State. “I was there in the Dáil when he made the apology. I feel very privileged to have been there. We felt that the warmth from him and the emotion he expressed when he read the apology,” she said.
Ms Currington came over the Bedfordshire seven months after leaving the Magdalen and made a new life for herself, becoming a mother and grandmother. In a hand-written letter delivered to Mr Kenny she wrote: “You changed the lives of so many Magdalen ladies the day you made the apology to the nation. It was a very emotional day which we will never forget. You gave us the courage to open up about what went in our past lives.”
