By Cate McCurry, PA
The Taoiseach is to issue a State apology to the families of the victims of the Stardust fire on Tuesday.
48 people were killed when the blaze ripped through the Dublin nightclub in 1981.
After a more than 40-year campaign for justice, last week an inquest found that all of the victims had been unlawfully killed.
A previous finding in 1982 said that the fire had been started deliberately, a theory the families never accepted.
That ruling was dismissed in 2009, leading to the latest inquests for the victims, who were aged from 16 to 27 and mostly came from the surrounding north Dublin area.
On Saturday, Taoiseach Simon Harris “apologised unreservedly” to the families at a meeting with them in Government Buildings.
Later on Tuesday, he will issue a State apology in the Dáíl. Families have been invited to attend, and the names of the victims will be read out in the Dáil chamber.
The Tánaiste Micheál Martin also expressed support for a redress scheme for the families.
Last Thursday, the jury in the inquest returned a verdict that all 48 victims were unlawfully killed.
A majority decision from the jury of seven women and five men found the blaze, which broke out in the early hours of Valentine’s Day 1981, was caused by an electrical fault in the hot press of the bar.
