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An Irish report into the experiences of children of gay parents reveals the closeness of such families, but also the anguish caused by legal loopholes that rob them of basic rights

EVAN BARRY, a 23-year-old Dubliner who works in the film industry, is explaining what it is like to have two mothers. “It was normal to me,” he says. “It was all I knew. I remember one day in school a guy came in and said ‘your parents are lesbians’. But before that I’d never put a word to it. I went home and said to my mothers ‘are you lesbians?’. I think I was eight or nine.”