Roderic O'Gorman (Dublin West, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

That is fine. This set of amendments deals with the issue of terminology used in the Bill, in particular the use of the term "illegal birth registration". In all of my communications and discussion of these issues I have always sought to very clearly understand the significance of illegal birth registrations and place the proper emphasis on it.

I am pleased to bring forward these very important amendments to the Succession Act. As the House knows, in the context of addressing the issue of illegal birth registrations my Department engaged significantly with a group of people who were impacted by illegal birth registrations in St. Patrick's Guild. One of the key issues was whether they could succeed to the estates of their parents, namely the people they had grown up with, knowing them as their parents all of their lives, but who were not their biological parents. People wondered whether they could succeed to those estates. When people discovered they had been subject to an illegal birth registration, it was an issue of very real and significant personal and legal concern for those affected.

We have worked closely on this issue. I thank the Minister for Justice and her team because the Succession Act is something addressed under the Department of Justice. We have worked very hard to address the issue. I am pleased to bring forward an amendment to the Succession Act 1965. The amendment provides that, subject to section 27A of that Act for the purposes of succession, the relationship between an affected person and his or her social father and mother, that is, the person he or she has grown up understanding is his or her father or mother, will be deemed retrospectively to be the same as the relationship between the affected person and his or her birth father and mother. In addition, it provides that all other relationships shall be deemed accordingly.

The effect of this is that affected persons will have the same rights of inheritance vis-à-vistheir social family as they have vis-à-vistheir birth family. This amendment also provides definitions for the purposes of succession, transition arrangements, assurances in regard to distributions received by affected persons, the shares of birth and social parents in the event an affected person dies intestate without a spouse, civil partner or issue and the distribution of shares on intestacy where a person may stand to inherit based on the social family relationship with the deceased and the birth family relationship with the deceased.

A significant number of important changes are being made that will provide real legal assurance to people who were subject to illegal birth registration in terms of their right of succession into the future. This will also legally copper-fasten any succession they have received from their social parents up to this point. This is something I flagged on Committee Stage that I would bring forward. It required significant engagement with the Department of Justice and the Office of the Attorney General, but it is an important element and one of the key legal questions that those subject to illegal birth registrations have raised since the fact of their illegal birth registrations was first revealed to them. I hope this amendment can receive the support of the House.

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