Fintan Warfield (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank all the witnesses. The exchange has been very informative and helpful. In all of this we should be mindful that we had a referendum for civil marriage equality in recent years. For many people, it redefined what it meant to be Irish, it recognised there is no single proposition for family formation and it also recognised that family formation is diverse.

This was illustrated when children of heterosexual lone parents tore down posters from the lamp posts which told us that every child deserved a mother and a father. Every week, I and others receive representations from same-sex parents, one of whom has no legal connection to their child. The knock-on effects are many, particularly in areas such as health, and they lead to huge anxieties.

Subhead 3 in the general scheme, under provision of information, states that each intending parent must have also received counselling from a genetic counsellor. Where there are two intending parents involved the counselling should be offered to them individually, jointly or both, depending on the couple's preferences. Do our guests have anything to say about whether this counselling should be offered beforehand, in addition to during and afterwards? If counselling is a legal requirement, should this be the case if the State is not prepared to offer financial support?