Survivors of Ireland’s mother and baby homes start to have benefits cut in UK after accepting compensation

The site of a mass grave for children who died in the Tuam mother and baby home in Galway. Photograph: Niall Carson/PA

Survivors of Ireland’s mother and baby homes have started to have benefits cut in Britain because they accepted compensation from the Irish government.

The cuts to the means-tested benefits of survivors in Britain come as campaigners including the actors Siobhán McSweeney and Steve Coogan called on Keir Starmer to back a bill known as Philomena’s Law, which would ringfence survivors’ benefits.