Tom Fleming (Kerry South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the proposed thirty-first amendment of the Constitution which expressly recognises children in their own right within the Constitution and enshrines and gives firmer recognition to their protection. It is important that the Oireachtas, in its deliberations, gets the strongest and most robust formula and wording possible in the Bill. The wording must be based on clarity and facts in order to ensure the public fully understands it is first and foremost about children and that it affirms at all stages the protection and empowerment of these children, who are in many cases incapable of speaking for themselves.

I will refer to a parliamentary question I put to the Minister last January asking about her plans to address the significant increase in calls to the Childline helpline on Christmas Day and asking her to make a statement on the matter. Her response was as follows:

Childline is a confidential listening service for children and young people operated by the Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, ISPCC. The service is available by telephone, online and mobile texting and is operated by professionally trained ISPCC staff and volunteers. The ISPCC reported that Childline received 1,387 calls and messages on Christmas day and that 85 ISPCC volunteers gave freely of their time to listen and support children who needed to talk to someone.

The Minister went on to state:

I have no precise information regarding the breakdown of the nature of the calls received by Childline on Christmas day. It is difficult therefore to make any assessment of the issues raised. However, I have asked the Health Service Executive, as the body charged with statutory responsibility for child welfare and protection matters and which has an established relationship with the ISPCC, to liaise directly with the ISPCC on this issue with a view to identifying any particular areas of concern arising from the level of contact made with Childline on Christmas day.

To be honest, this response is a sad reflection on society. It exemplifies in micro fashion how on this particular day of festivity some 1,387 children felt they had to pick up the telephone and voice their concerns to the 85 volunteers who, fortunately, were accepting calls. I compliment the ISPCC on its Childline service and on the work it carries out to protect and support the many vulnerable children it encounters in its role.

The Minister also mentioned the HSE. There should be more contact and greater liaison and co-operation between Childline and the HSE to ensure maximum intervention protocols and the necessary monitoring systems are put in place. I compliment support groups such as Barnardos and the Jack and Jill Children's Foundation which have restricted budgets and rely on voluntary efforts to carry out their vital roles in improving the quality of life of thousands of children.

The need for constitutional reform has been accepted for many years. It was discussed intermittently, if not at length, in the Oireachtas in the early 1980s. A number of official reports that called for constitutional change to strengthen the rights of children were left on the shelf to gather dust. The many court cases concerning child welfare in recent years have served to highlight the inadequacy of the current constitutional recognition afforded to the rights of children. The Office of the Ombudsman for Children has been calling for stringent protection for children's rights in the Constitution since the establishment of that office over eight years ago. The ombudsman, Ms Emily Logan, first called for an amendment to the Constitution in January 2005 to enhance children's rights. She has demonstrated since, especially through her office’s complaints work, that there is an urgent need for children’s rights to be enhanced in the Constitution. Many of the complaints with which she deals highlight a lack of awareness about the impact of civil and public administrative decision-making on the lives and rights of children and their families. In her submissions to the Oireachtas she has called for a number of key elements to be included in the Constitution. These include an express statement of the rights of the child, the best interests principle, a State duty to support families while responding in a proportionate manner and a provision to enable the sharing of soft information. I am glad that many of her recommendations are contained in this proposal. I hope the democratic exercise on 10 November will endorse the referendum proposal and enshrine key children’s rights principles in the Constitution in order to underpin a fundamental shift in our law, practice and policy on children.

I congratulate the Minister on the compilation of the Bill. I wish her well in her efforts to bring it through the Houses and have it endorsed.

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