Dan Neville (Limerick, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak to the Children and Family Relationships Bill. It is long overdue. I commend the Minister on bringing the Bill to the House. The Bill will modernise the law in respect of children living in diverse family forms. It is intended to address the security needs of those children and their family situations, whether they are living with married parents, unmarried parents, a parent and the parent's partner, a grandparent or another relative who is parenting the child.

Society has changed significantly in the 51 years since the Guardianship of Infants Act was introduced in 1964. My lifetime has seen significant changes in society and children in society. The realities of modern life have changed significantly in that period. Previously, people took the view that children should be seen and not heard and that corporal punishment was acceptable and legal in the home and in schools. The changes have been significant since those times. Previously, family law assumed that a married couple would take the responsibility for rearing children. However, the family situation has changed significantly since then. Now, the majority of children are reared in married families, but there are lone-parent households, blended families or households headed by same-sex couples, grandparents or other relatives as well.

The children in such diverse families need the State to recognise their status as a family and legislate to allow them to function as a family.

The Bill modernises Irish law on a range of complex and sensitive areas such as parentage, custody, access, maintenance and adoption. It puts the welfare of the child as the central consideration. This is the central theme of the Bill, as it should be the central theme of society, namely, it is child-centred and the interests of the child are paramount in considering legislation. The people decided this in the referendum to change the Constitution to recognise the child's welfare as being predominant in terms of treatment by the authorities, services and society.

The 2011 census outlined that 215,300 families were headed by lone parents and 44% of these parents had never been married. There were 49,005 households of cohabiting couples with children under 15 years of age. The number of children living in cohabiting households rose by 41% between 2006 and 2011. We urgently need modern legislation that recognises the changes that have happened in society. I firmly believe a child has a right to know and to be parented by both parents. It should be a central issue for society that there is an expectation of and a duty on parents to parent the child, except in exceptional circumstances, because that is a child's right. With rights come responsibilities for the parents in those situations.

The Bill makes the best interests of the child paramount in decisions on guardianship, custody and access. It also empowers the court to appoint an expert to ascertain the child's views in proceedings on guardianship, custody and access where the child is not able to express his or her views directly. This is a very welcome change given that, 51 years ago, the child's views would not even have been considered by the courts or those with responsibility for ensuring the child's welfare was taken care of.

I welcome the Bill and again congratulate the Minister on bringing it forward.

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