Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

-----but not a rewriting.

When I was speaking earlier, I forgot to thank the citizens' assembly and the joint Oireachtas committee for their work. The citizens' assembly worked right through the Covid pandemic. It is important to acknowledge it. I acknowledge it here now. It has done us a great service, as has the cross-party committee, and produced a report. Unfortunately, the Minister ignored them on this matter. While I was very supportive of the Minister on the previous Bill, I am not a bit supportive of him in respect of this one.

I will start by saying that much of what Deputy Murphy, who is the neutral Chair at the moment, said resonated with me about what the real debate should be about. I am taking an unusual view in that the special place of the woman in the home has never really been tested. It has been interpreted generally as a very restrictive approach to women. I already mentioned the architecture of institutions of the 20th century across more than 100 years. In parallel with that was the ban on married women working. Women could not sit on juries. Women could not inherit in their own right until 1965, and then only got some measure of protection, etc. All of that was captured by the Kerry babies tribunal. That shocking, disgraceful tribunal was there to investigate the gardaí but really put the woman on trial. That captures some of the 20th century. That went parallel with the forces that got stronger and stronger, which interpreted that clause as being very Catholic, which it was, about the special place of the woman in the home. The idea behind it was to protect, while it happened to be the woman who was mentioned, a person to be at home to mind children. It valued the caring role and stated that people should not suffer as a result of that. It really never has been tested in the courts.

I thank the people who produced the digest and the legal people who contributed to the debate, including Professor O'Mahony, the former rapporteur for children, and the Limerick professor. They have been good in outlining matters. What struck me was the quote of Susan Denham. In a dissenting judgment, she said that particular article of the Constitution does not consign women to the home. It set out to protect the role. What she said was interesting in the context of the case of the Senator and the Minister for Education. She wrote: "The Constitution is a living document. It must be construed as a document of its time." She also stated: "This special recognition is of the 21st century and belongs to the whole of society." She continued: "Article 41.2 does not assign women to a domestic role." She refers to recognition, which is important, stating: "Article 41.2 recognises the significant role played by wives and mothers in the home." She further stated that this recognition and acknowledgement does not exclude women and mothers from working in other activities outside. Unfortunately, we know that it did because of a very conservative Government with a particular view of women and where they should be. Those things happened in parallel.

What is extraordinary about Susan Denham and also Mr. Justice Barr in a family law case in the High Court, which was unfortunately overturned in the Supreme Court as going a step too far, was that he put an economic value on the mother at home in a family law separation case. He put an economic value on the woman. The Supreme Court, of course, slapped his hand and said he could not do that. The point I am making is that the recognition of what the woman was doing at home and the value put on it was extremely important.

I can see the fact that it is gender-specific is a problem. However, the courts, leaving out the courts I just mentioned, have been open to interpreting the Constitution as a living document and a woman in the home would have to be a man or a woman in the home, whoever is the primary carer. Unfortunately, it has never been tested. Judges themselves have expressed surprise. Mr. Justice Hogan has expressed great surprise that this particular article was never tested because the carer is being given special protection in the home. I understand there is one case pending in the Supreme Court relating to social welfare. The Minister probably has more details on it than I. It is testing some part of this in relation to the obligation on the State to not only protect the carer but to back that up with economic action. That is what is missing.

We are now rushing this Bill through. Once again, I have the same criticism, namely, that the Minister is rushing it through for International Women's Day, which has really taken the joy out of International Women's Day for me, because I do not agree with this language he is using, which is extremely weak. The history of this goes back to 1993, some 30 years ago. We are now rushing it through for 8 March. The Commission on the Status of Women said to delete this article. In 1996, the Constitution review group recommended deleting it and replacing it. In 1997, the first progress report of the all-party Oireachtas committee said to replace it. I will not go through all those other reports. I will pick out the bigger ones. The Government task force in 2016 gave options in for the replacement of it. In 2018, there was a ministerial announcement by Deputy Charles Flanagan at the time, and, of course, nothing happened.

We then move forward to the citizens' assembly, which I have praised and which came up with strong but practical recommendations, given that the role of carers was brought into acute focus during the Covid crisis. It put a lens on the importance of caring, which is undervalued in our economy. Having that experience and having listened to the 99 citizens, it came up with specific recommendations that the Minister has ignored. That was followed by the Joint Committee on Gender Equality, the recommendations of which have been ignored. The Library and Research Service helpfully points out that on 25 April, the interdepartmental committee invited submissions. Those submissions closed on 19 May this year. There is a very helpful note stating that, at the time of writing, a report of the consultation was not published. Perhaps the Minister can tell us why that was not published because that would help us to understand his logic and reasoning for why he went for this very vague language.

There is lots of other language that I would use if I was replacing this, although I reserve my position in respect of bringing a court case in relation to the protection given in the article the Minister is replacing. Having said that, on the other hand, there is any number of suggestions from feminist organisations. I would happily class myself as a pragmatic, practical mother and feminist. They talk about the ethics of care and the caring economy, as Kathleen Lynch, emeritus professor in UCD, has done for years about care being undervalued, commodified and privatised. That is the second part of the debate that we should be having. How do we create the conditions in which a parent of either sex can be at home and not be forced out into a market by the demands of a neoliberal approach to society that has led us to the precipice with climate change and wars? That is a debate worth having.

The next debate worth having is how we constantly have economists constantly telling us about the economy without looking at what unpaid carers are doing. Almost 300,000 unpaid carers work day and night in order that our economy can thrive. A value is never put on it. A language is never put on it.

Let me tell the Minister what I would agree with. Feminists say to recognise the contribution of care work to economic development, social cohesion, human capabilities and so on. The second matter is for society to collectively assume the cost of care through the funding of public service, timesaving infrastructure, care workers, and good conditions. The third is for policymakers to engage with those most impacted by care gaps, including care providers and so on. Some 299,000 people provide care, unpaid, day and night. We have a Taoiseach in this country who continuously lauds those people who get up early in the morning. Some people do not get up early in the morning because they are up all night. That type of language of rewarding the workers and those who get up early in the morning is a self-serving, selfish, horrible narrative that hides the real value of carers to society.

The language the Minister is using here is wishy-washy and unacceptable.

I would almost take my chances on taking the special protection of the mother in the home all the way to the Supreme Court, arguing that in the modern interpretation "mother" includes whichever parent is at home, rather than what the Government is proposing:

The State recognises that the provision of care, by members of a family to one another by reason of the bonds that exist among them, gives to Society a support without which the common good cannot be achieved, and shall strive to support such provision.

I do not have much difficulty with the word "strive" because it is similar to endeavour. My big difficulty is the wishy-washy nature of it, the Government's failure to follow the recommendations of the citizens' assembly and the cross-party committee and the failure to create an obligation. The proposed amendment does not even spell out the serious gift given to us by carers which allows the economy to thrive. It is a wishy-washy recognition without any obligation. If we have learned anything from Covid-19 and climate change, it is that we need transformative change and we get that by recognising it is impossible to put a value on carers. Let us recognise it clearly.

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