historian adele chynoweth writes about the good shepherd sisters denying history: there are no precise figures for the number of girls who slaved in the ten magdalene laundries run by the good shepherd sisters in twentieth century australia. this is because the order of the good shepherd sisters has not released its records. we do know, as a result of the federal senate report on forgotten australians (2004) that the good shepherd laundries in australia acted as prisons for the girls who were forced to labor in workhouses laundering linen for local hospitals or commercial premises. the report also described the conditions as characterized by inedible food, unhygienic living conditions and little or no education. in 2008, in federal parliament, senator andrew murray likened the convent of the good shepherd, "the pines," adelaide, to a prisoner-of-war camp.