Seán Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)

No. However, our equal status legislation rightly bans discrimination and creates an offence of discrimination. Therefore, someone who wishes to discriminate can be dealt with under existing legislation. People should be educated into believing that one should not interfere with the religious rights of others, which are their own business. The job of Members is to deal with human situations in which circumstances such as a break-up, death or whatever dictate that people's property rights should be protected. This also is the purpose of this Bill, particularly in respect of cohabiting couples and in particular to the rights of the children. Were we to educate society into thinking like this rather than always thinking of such matters in religious terms, we would have a far better society. Sticking people into jail for six months will only make martyrs out of them and I do not discern a necessity for such a legislative provision. As I noted, legislation already exists to deal with any form of legislation and the Equal Status Act can be used to deal with that issue at any time. However, it would be worthwhile to try to understand other people's points of view and to relieve them of any difficulties they may have with regard to their own conscience.

I welcome the fact that this legislation deals with same-sex relationships. People are living together perfectly happily, which is their business. Members' business as politicians is to ensure that if something happens, such as a break-up or a death of one of the parties, there is protection for the other partner. This is what this legislation endeavours to do. Unfortunately, cohabiting couples do not have rights currently and if one of the partners dies, particularly the income earner, this can result in a horrific scenario for the surviving partners and children. There is no such thing as common law marriage and, therefore, there are no legal rights. The Bill endeavours to deal with this issue and not before time because I have dealt with too many cases where surviving partners and their children have suffered greatly.

There is cross-party support for the legislation but on Committee Stage if we can deal with people's fear in a rational and reasonable way while, at the same time, making sure we do not encourage any form of discrimination, we should do so. Amendments may be tabled to strengthen the rights of children. In 2006, cohabiting couples had 74,500 children. That is a significant number and it is probably nearer 100,000 today. They are human beings and their rights must be protected at all costs. I wish the legislation well and I hope people understand our job, as legislators, is to protect people's rights regarding property and so on.

During the divorce referendum debate I was confronted by a priest outside a church who said I should have been ashamed of myself because I supported divorce. I asked him what problems he had with divorce. He said, "It is contrary to the teachings of the church". I put the following simple question to him: "If I arrived to your church with my partner and said I wanted to get married and you arranged and performed the religious ceremony and then invited me to sign the register, which is the civil part of the marriage and I said, "No, Father, I am not interested", would I be married?". He said I would be married in the eyes of God. I asked him whether I would be married in the eyes of the State and he said I would not. I explained to him that all we were doing was allowing the civil aspect of marriage to cease under certain conditions. We were not interfering with the religious marriage, as it was up to each individual to decide whether he or she should remarry following a divorce. I said that was his business and that our business was to deal with the civil aspect of marriage.

The same argument applies in principle to this legislation. The rights and wrongs of cohabiting couples, whether they are gay or heterosexual, is a matter for each individual. Our duty is to ensure where there is a break up, death and so on, safeguards are in place, particularly where children are affected. If that message can be understood by people who are concerned about this legislation on religious grounds, we will have done a good job. However, in Great Britain, an amendment proposed by Lord Mackay provides that where somebody has a genuine conscientious objection, they should not be put in prison. Plenty of others can perform what has to be performed and a big issue should not be made of this because all it will do is divide society. I ask that we discuss the possibility of adopting a similar amendment on Committee Stage.

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