Joe Higgins (Dublin West, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

I welcome any parliamentary or Government initiative that highlights the welfare and well-being of children in our society and any attempts to move in a direction that would improve their situation. With regard to the welfare of children and their care on this island, the institutions that preceded the State or were established since it was founded have generally been very good when it comes to fine words and worthy sentiments. However, realising what the words mean or aspire to is a different matter. We can go back to the Proclamation of the Provisional Government of the Irish Republic, issued in Easter week 1916, which famously stated that the Republic "declares its resolve to pursue the happiness and prosperity of the whole nation ... cherishing all the children of the nation equally". Unfortunately, the seven signatories to that proclamation were all murdered within weeks of its publication. I have no doubt they were sincere in believing that this should be the case but those who subsequently ruled the Irish State betrayed that aspiration in many ways.

The 1937 Constitution of Ireland falls far short of the aspirations of the Proclamation. The Constitution refers to the natural and imprescriptible rights of the child in the crucial area of education, for example, but when one reads what it states, namely, that the State guarantees to respect the inalienable right and duty of parents to provide according to their means for the religious, moral, intellectual, physical and social education of their children, the words that leap out are "according to their means". Far from cherishing the children of the nation equally, this enshrines an acceptance of the reality in capitalist society that there are and will be massive differences in the way children are treated by and within the education system because the means of working class and poor parents are different from those of the wealthier echelons of society and it is this wealth that determined the quality of education their offspring received through the many decades before and after the 1937 Constitution was written. It follows from what is in the Constitution, therefore, that there is gross inequality in education, as has been evident. The Catholic Church was very much at the heart of institutionalised inequality in the State. The religious orders operated the most privileged fee-paying schools which educated the betters of society, as they saw it, to take their rightful place in all the crucial areas of life such as law, medicine and many others. The church had a grip on education for the poorer sections also, but there was a grotesque inequality between the two. The horror of child sexual abuse at the hands of some individuals of the religious is a somewhat different issue in that obviously it was criminal and outside the scope of any constitution, but there were other aspects of institutionalisation such as reform schools, etc. which combined church and State.

The question that arises for us and the Government is: what are the prospects for the children's rights referendum? Will it make a transformational difference in the lives of hundreds of thousands of children in the State? The majority will welcome any measure that enhances the rights and welfare of children. They will agree that the State should step in where children are suffering neglect or abuse at the hands of a parent and that anomalies in the adoption law should be corrected. We welcome these provisions and I have no doubt they will be prescribed in law, but it is a narrow remit. The reality is that the amendment repeats, in a different way, the broader rights in terms of real equality, adequate comfort, adequate provision, etc. It repeats the affirmation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of all children, but the caveat is that the State shall, as far as is practicable, by its laws, protect and vindicate these rights. The words "as far as is practicable" come screaming off the page at me because in the State up to 96,000 children are living in consistent poverty, which is the grim reality. Their households account for less than 60% of national median income. They are enduring a number of negatives which include going without food or living in cold conditions, while a further 200,000 are at risk of poverty. The austerity agenda on the shoulders of Irish working class people that is part of the bailout programme for billionaire bankers and bondholders is intensifying that level of poverty and the suffering of those trapped in this position. The many other ill-effects on children such as the reduction in the numbers of special needs assistants and the lack of adequate provision for children with special needs are all part of that process and made worse by the ongoing programme of austerity. The Government will say it is not practicable, therefore, to provide for economic rights for children that would guarantee a different life and lifestyle of having plenty for every human being because capitalism, in its current crisis, the money market system of Europe, in its current crisis, and the imperative that has been accepted by two Governments to bail out the super rich at the expense of the poor and working people will not allow it. In that sense I am afraid, therefore, that this provision will be similar to the fine words in the Proclamation and the 1937 Constitution. By all means, let us pass the constitutional amendment on children's rights, but for socialists on the left who are representatives of working class communities, it will only have meaning if the words contained therein are given effect and we fight for a society where wealth and resources would be in democratic ownership for the benefit of the great majority and used to cherish, in a real way, all the children of the nation equally.

Mar fhocal scoir, ba mhaith liom a rá cé go bhfuilimid chun tacaíocht a thabhairt don leasú seo agus don reifreann, táimid ag rá go bhfuil an-chuid polasaithe níos doimhne ag teastáil chun athrú cinnte a dhéanamh maidir le saol leanaí sa tír seo. Deireann Bunreacht na bliana 1937 gur foláir don Stát:

ós é an Stát caomhnóir leasa an phobail, iarracht a dhéanamh le beart oiriúnach chun ionad na dtuistí a ghlacadh, ag féachaint go cuí i gcónaí, áfach, do chearta nádúrtha dochloíte an linbh.

Creidimid i gcearta nádúrtha agus dochloíte an linbh, ach an pointe atá á dhéanamh agam ná nár cuireadh na cearta siúd i bhfeidhm sa tír seo ag gach Rialtas agus gur fágadh an-chuid leanaí i riocht bochtanais agus deacraíochta.

Má tá aon brí le leasú nua a thabhairt isteach don Bhunreacht anseo, ní bheidh brí ann go dtí go mbeidh beart déanta chomh maith an infheistíocht a chur isteach i dtreo agus nach mbeidh aon bhochtanas i measc leanaí sa tír seo agus go dtí go mbeidh na hacmhainní ann chun go mbeidh saol le dínit, le hoideachas, le sláinte agus gach seirbhís eile ar aon leibhéal i measc leanaí go hiomlán sa tír seo.

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