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IN MAY 2015, over 1.2 million people voted in favour of marriage equality here. That vote for equality echoed around the world. It sent out a flare that a new Ireland was emerging – an Ireland that was more tolerant, inclusive and welcoming of all LGBTQ+ people. It heralded a new era in which Ireland would be a forerunner for LGBTQ+ equality and a beacon of hope for people around the world.
The marriage equality referendum vote was about more than just the right to marry. The will of the people was clear; they wanted LGBTQ+ people and LGBTQ+ relationships treated equally by the State.
In the aftermath of the vote, there is an onus on the Government to make that vision a reality. Unfortunately, the important work to reform the law has been slow and, eight years after the referendum, there are still gaps in the law.
The enactment of the Children and Family Relationships Act 2015 was a significant and welcome step in the right direction for equality for children of LGBTQ+ parents. For the first time in the State, two same-sex intended parents could be listed on a child’s birth certificate.
This meant that LGBTQ+ headed family units became recognised by the State, and a legal parent-child relationship could be established between both intended parents and child.
However, both intended parents could only be listed on the child’s birth certificate if the circumstances of the child’s birth and conception fell within the strict parameters of the legislation.
Unfortunately, we know from research by Dr Lydia Bracken from the University of Limerick that the majority of children born into LGBTQ+ headed families are conceived or born outside the narrow parameters and, as a result, are prevented from having a legal parent-child relationship with both of their parents. This is an injustice.
Ivana Bacik / Twitter
Ivana Bacik / Twitter / Twitter
To remedy this situation, today I introduced a new private members bill in the Dáil. The bill, which has been produced in collaboration and partnership with LGBT Ireland and Equality for Children, if passed, would close the gaps in the law.
The Labour Party has been a proud and vocal ally of the LGBTQ+ community for decades. This bill is another page in the long chapter on Labour’s role in fighting for LGBTQ+ equality. My predecessor and then Tánaiste, Eamon Gilmore, aptly described marriage equality as the civil rights issue of our generation. I’m proud of the role the Labour Party played in securing and winning the referendum. While that battle was won, we have more work to do. This is about fairness. This is about human rights and, ultimately, it’s about equality for children.
The former Special Rapporteur for Child Protection, Professor Conor O’ Mahony, in his 2020 report, A Review of Children’s Rights and Best Interests in the Context of Donor-Assisted Human Reproduction and Surrogacy and Irish Law, said that the current framework has had a negative impact on children’s rights to non-discrimination and to recognition of family relationships.
At present, there are four categories of children born through donor-assisted human reproduction who are prevented from forming a full legal relationship with both of their female parents.
These are children conceived with a known donor prior to May 2020, children conceived in non-clinical settings, children conceived outside of Ireland and children born outside of Ireland. The place of your birth or the mechanics of your conception should not determine whether or not you can have a full legal relationship with your parents. There are no moral, ethical or policy reasons why children of same-sex couples are being denied full family rights.
The detailed bill I’m proposing in the Dáil addresses all four areas. It offers a process whereby an application can be made to the court where all the substantive policy aims of the current legislation can be met. This means that where intending parents have gone through screening, confirmed the consent of those involved and registered identifying information in respect of the donor they can be granted their declaration of parentage by the Court.
The bill introduces a presumption of maternity to offer true equality to children of both opposite and same-sex couples. It also introduces the paramountcy principle to ensure that, in all court applications under the Children and Family Relationships Act, the best interests of the child are the paramount consideration. Finally, it rights the wrong of the exclusion of the use of known donors from retrospective declarations of parentage, which was based on a faulty legal premise that parentage could only be transferred if the genetic father was unknown.
While these may seem like minor technical changes to some, the granting of full parentage would have a profound impact on the children and parents, particularly when children are sick, need to establish citizenship, require legal documents such as a passport and when it comes to tax status, inheritance and in the event of marital breakup. The changes will provide security and comfort. Most importantly, it will provide legal confirmation of what is a practical reality.
It would end the legal limbo that has left hundreds of children of same-sex female couples with no way to establish a legal relationship with both of their parents, who love and care for them on a daily basis.
Children of LGBTQ+ people must be treated equally. They must be afforded the same rights as other children – nothing less, nothing more. The Government’s Assisted Human Reproduction Bill, which is currently at Committee Stage in the Dáil, would have been the ideal vehicle to address the lacuna in the law. Unfortunately, the Bill as it currently stands doesn’t deal with these issues. This is a shame and a missed opportunity for reform. In addition, that bill has been delayed time and again.
Families shouldn’t have to wait any longer. With cross-party support and Government time in the Dáil, the bill I’m introducing this week could and should be enacted. The equality the people voted for in the Marriage Equality Referendum won’t be fully realised until this issue is resolved.
Ivana Bacik is the leader of the Labour Party and a Labour TD for Dublin Bay South.
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Interesting study. Of course airlines disagree, since it hits then where it hurts.
@The Descolada: *them
@The Descolada: it will hit you harder when airfares double because of this or there’s no direct flights left to places you’d like to visit in the future. Air travel is an industry that weshould be supported not demonising. Without it our island nation would be left in isolation. Think before you write
@The Descolada: Airlines are a business, not a charity. If there’s a route that’s not viable, the route won’t last. So two options, increase the fare being charged or cut the route altogether. Nobody needs reminding we are an island nation!
@The Descolada: the study was done in 2017 with no masks. This is complete nonsense.
@The Descolada: Irish traffic has been the most affected in Europe. I doubt they need the middle seats. American carriers blocked it off until recently. Not anymore due successful vaccine rollout
@The Descolada: Can you blame them insofar that they’ve been pretty much put out of business for over a year. Mark my words, between Covid and the Greens, this world is and will continue to be a much less fun place particularly when it comes to travel.
@The Descolada: the Airlines paid for the study , and several US Airlines have been using this policy for months now.
16,000 people arrived into Dublin in the last two weeks. Are they all corona virus free I do wonder!!?
@Brian Kelly: yes. With mandatory pcr tests 99% of them would be. Sure the 500+ daily cases are probably being spread in supermarkets and/social interactions
@Brian Kelly: Really. Do you ever wonder how case numbers and hospital figures are falling constantly if they weren’t all virus free?
@BRIAN MCCARTHY: Yeah because we didnt get the variants through travel. It was all supermarkets
@BRIAN MCCARTHY: More like meat factories.
So the price of a flight ticket will go up by 1.5 times
@Jim Buckley Barrett: Yes and in six months the same people will be moaning about Ryanair rip off.
What a surprise since we’ve been told for over a year to stay between 1 to 2 m apart.
When will a study look into the relationship between reducing the funding of public healthcare systems for decades and the impact on people recovering or on the budgets of healthcare systems vs budget of Covid handling?
@Claude Saulnier: Its already done. It was in the lancet around 6 months ago. If I get time I’ll try and find the link….
@Sean Oige: not the paper that I was looking for but there is a lot of work being done on it. https://socialprotection.org/discover/blog/universal-health-coverage-uhc-and-coronavirus-crisis-%E2%80%93-challenges-and-responses
@Claude Saulnier: Are you for real, the issue with our Health Service is not underfunding, we actually have one of the best funded Health Services. The issue with our health service has always been about decades of mismanagement, wanton wastage of money, too many pen pushers and not enough medical staff as a result. Add in to the mix unions completely averse to any kind of change, and voila you have the Irish Health Service.
So basically flying will now go back to being an expensive exercise again for most, cos taking away middle seats will mean prices will go up. If people are vaccinated and are allowed enter a country, then it shouldn’t matter where they sit on a plane. Between this and the political version of covid 19 known as the greens trying to get rid if 10 euro flights, I have a feeling plenty will have to save a whole lot more and have less chance of taking short haul flights going forward cos this just sounds like a mess
@Tarraing Mo Liathróidí: These seem to be interpolated studies based upon other ones, none of which took into account all the factors like wearing masks or vaccinations. The truth being, nobody knows until it’s tried in a real world senario.
If this was a 100% death sentenance for all, and we tend to lose sight of the fact the it will be for a small minority of people, I doubt anyone would dare get on any plane, mask, vaccination or not.
I thought it had to be 2 metres apart for covid , last time I checked the aisle seat and the window seat on my Ryanair flight were not 2 metres apart, more like 50cm tops, this is just another nonsense make it up as we go along study.
@Hugo Bugo: The study suggests that blocking the middle seat can reduce transmission. It doesn’t suggest that staying 0.5 metres apart can prevent covid transmission. Go back to sleep I’d say
@HectorPickaxe: Each seat should be it’s own individual sealed, sterilized, oxygen-fed pod ….. That way we can sit in our own filth for 8 hrs to New York, without bothering the fragile-minded, worried about catching anything….. Prices of flights will go through the roof, but hey, as long as the PC snowflakes feel safe, it makes total sense ….
@HectorPickaxe: if you are gullible enough to swallow this kind of nonsense then I think u need more than sleep to fix that for u, a virus that is transmitted through the air with a passenger that is 40 to 50cm away from u to the left, to the right, in front and behind u but leaving the middle seat empty will lower transmission when it’s been drilled into us for 12 months that 2 metres is the magic number, OMG u are so gullible its hilarious, I would love to be doing business deals or be a salesman on your doorstep, lol.
More bunkum, the fact is if you’re vaccinated it doesn’t matter , if you’re not , you ain’t flying anywhere anyway in the next few years
@Dave McCabe: Vaccines much less effective against SA and Brazil variants, so it does matter.
I have not seen any evidence of Covid spread on an aircraft if ppl are wearing masks..
@Aire Dezamba: apart from you know the British variant that plagued this country in December in Janaury after over 50k people had flown into Ireland for Christmas
@Aidan O’ Neill: they most likely had Covid before travelling….
Google it, I’ve seen loads of published seating plans showing how a couple of people spread it to several other people on the same flight. More so in America where they regularly fly between States.
@Fiona Fitzgerald: masks are working and help to prevent Covid on flights..”Emirates had five flights with seven or more infected passengers on each flight, for a total of 58 coronavirus-positive passengers flying on eight-hour trips. And yet, nobody else on the planes — none of the other 1,500 to 2,000 passengers — picked up the virus, Freedman and his colleague report in the Journal of Travel Medicine”. …passengers were wearing masks
Flying Petri dishes. Of course the airlines want you to think they’re safe. How come you end up with a cold every time you get off a plane?
Many airlines have done this throughout the pandemic. United airlines only now unblocked it last month. Vulnerable have all been afforded vaccine in the US I guess
Flight out to Spain last week was packed with families.. Barely an empty seat on it! And no, I wasn’t on it, friend flew out to her sick mother!
If one is concerned about someone sitting next to them, buy those seats. Simple
Suggests! A new science similar to unknown “experts say”
thats news from 12 months ago
Airlines refused reduce passengers and if argee reduce passengers may end up increase cost ticket flight
@Brian Flavin: Maybe they could put some parcels in the middle seat to defray costs? I’m not flying anywhere until I get my jabs, but I was thinking that I’d be fine staying put beside a silent stack of post for a flight.
@Fiona Fitzgerald: I think that would be a health and safety issue in case of an emergency etc.
have your say