Sir, – The Government could do three things that would increase the health of all children in the coming years: three things that do not need a referendum. 1. Ban alcohol advertising. 2. Ban fast-food advertising. 3.Give all schoolchildren an android tablet of one sort of another so that they don’t have to carry heavy books. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – The State and the family are two of the strongest social institutions in Ireland today. The function of the State is to promote justice. The role of the family, as defined emphatically in Article 42 is to be “the primary and natural educator of the child”. These roles are distinct. They must be kept distinct. Voting No on November 10th is the only way to preserve this distinction and keep society safe.
Societies run smoothly when power and responsibility are invested in more than one institution; by contrast, this amendment invests the State with absolute power and responsibility for children.
The referendum has little or nothing to do with children’s rights, for under Article 40 children already have rights. Rather, the reason the State is inserting a new article on children is because the State is taking ultimate responsibility for children from the family, where it has traditionally been.
Retired judge Hugh O’Flaherty confirmed the same when he recently said that “all – or nearly all – all of the objectives of the amendment are to be found in our existing Constitution, in ordinary legislation, or in court judgments.”
The State’s power is amplified in this article because it is power without safeguards. Up until now, our Constitution has been the envy of the world because it balanced the power of various social institutions with skill and insight – including the delicate balance of the family and the State. Every single subsection in the current Article 42 safeguards the rights of parents and the family in its wording.
In Article 42A (proposed in the referendum), not one such safeguard exists. The State and laws are mentioned 10 times, the family is mentioned zero times. To hand the State such power does not just compromise the family unit, it effectively abolishes its power.
Many will argue that the constitutional provisions in Article 42 will remain unchanged, and the family protected; this is a smokescreen. The new article effectively annuls the provisions of Article 42 in all cases of conflict, which are essentially the only ones that matter. Parents will still have the duty to provide for their children’s education; however, in all cases of conflict, the State will be invested with absolute power to remove children from their parents even if there is only a “likely” chance of harm to the child. This is a new and dangerous development.
The purpose of this referendum is to compromise the family under the misnomer of children’s rights. The amendment bequests ultimate discretionary power to the State. All families should be appalled. It must be rejected at all costs, for the children’s sake. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – The text of the proposed amendments to the Constitution still does not specify the actual rights of the child and therefore the courts will continue to interpret these rights on a case by case basis. This continues to be a serious concern.
Ireland ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1992 but to-date the provisions of the convention have not been expressly incorporated into Irish law. The Irish Human Rights Commission (IHRC) has highlighted that the level of penetration of the convention into Irish law remains very low. Indeed, in its 2006 progress report to the UN, the IHRC suggested that there was scope to raise awareness of the convention among the judiciary and the legal professions.
Although the proposed amendments are broadly welcome, there is still a long road ahead for Ireland to attain and demonstrate international best practice. – Yours, etc,