The head of the inquiry into institutional child abuse in Northern Ireland is today issuing an appeal to anyone who suffered such abuse to come forward.
In Belfast this morning Sir Anthony Hart, chairman of the Historical Institutional Abuse Inquiry, is launching a promotional campaign, which will utilise advertising on 80 bus shelters throughout Northern Ireland, to try to engage with those who might not otherwise get to hear about the inquiry.
More than 175 people have so far asked to provide details of their experience in institutional care to the inquiry which is scheduled to report by January 2016. The inquiry is estimated to cost between £15-£19 million.
Posters and literature providing information about the inquiry are being distributed to relevant organisations in Britain and Ireland who may have access to such people and to libraries, GP surgeries and hospitals in the North .
The inquiry was announced by the Northern Executive in September 2011 following an inter departmental task force report.
It will examine allegations of abuse at institutions in the North from 1922 until 1995.
