Ciarán Cannon (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister of State to the Chamber. The American journalist Bill Moyers, who has written extensively on the essence of politics and democracy, once said that "Ideas are great arrows, but there has to be a bow, and politics is the bow of idealism". There should always be room for idealism in politics. Without idealism, politics would be a shallow and utterly pointless pursuit. Those of us who are parents always strive to create the ideal home environment for our children, though we may not always succeed. Those of us who are involved in community activism strive to create communities that are vibrant and inclusive, and again we may not always succeed. I also believe that the vast majority of us who have chosen politics as a career have done so in the hope that we can play our part, no matter how small, in shaping the ideal nation, a nation of which we can all be proud. While our idealism may often be diluted by the cynicism of others or by a lack of resources, it should still be the reason we get up every morning to do the work we do.

Just over 20 years ago, the UN General Assembly adopted a far-reaching and idealistic treaty that would dramatically alter the way the world looks at children. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, developed after years of intricate negotiations, offered a vision of a world in which all children survive and develop, and are protected, respected and encouraged to participate in the decisions that affect them. Based on the four core principles of non-discrimination, the best interest of the child, the right to life, survival and development, and respect for the views of the child, the convention made it not just wise and just, but legally imperative for governments to recognize and uphold children's rights. Twenty years later, it is clear that the convention has inspired a global movement for children's rights and that laws have been changed to protect children better. Since 1989, the convention has been ratified by 193 countries. More than 70 countries have incorporated children's codes into national legislation, as part of law reform efforts based on the convention's provisions.

Here in Ireland, the Children's Rights Alliance is a coalition of over 80 NGOs working to secure the rights and needs of children in this country. It aims to improve the lives of all of our children through securing the necessary changes in Ireland's laws, policies and services. The vision statement of the Children's Rights Alliance is immensely powerful in its simplicity and brevity. It states that Ireland will be one of the best places in the world to be a child. It is just one simple sentence, almost childlike in its formation and I suspect it is deliberately so. We should be ashamed that following years of unprecedented wealth, Ireland is not already one of the best places in the world to be a child. The alliance is equally succinct in proposing how to reach that goal. Its mission statement also contains only one sentence, one ambition and that is to realise the rights of children in Ireland through securing the full implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Every healthily functioning and meaningful democracy requires an underlying ethos, a philosophy which guides us in making decisions that affect the lives of our citizens. Here in Ireland, that ethos is contained in our Constitution. The new constitutional article published two weeks ago by the Joint Committee on the Constitutional Referendum on Children, if accepted by our people in a referendum, would transform our constitutional ethos and would result in our constitution for the first time expressly acknowledging a child's individual humanity and rights. Rather than usurping the role of parents in a child's life, the new proposed article instead recognises and respects that role. While requiring the State to intervene where children are truly at risk, it ensures that any such intervention must not only be effective but must also be proportionate. The new article also holds out the possibility of adoption to approximately 2,000 children presently in long-term care, mainly long-term foster care, who have no realistic prospect of being brought up by one or both of their biological parents for the rest of their childhood. As the Minister of State pointed out, they are living in limbo.

We as politicians are often accused of being overly partisan and incapable of putting aside our political differences to work for the greater good. The valuable work done by the Joint Committee on the Constitutional Referendum on Children should help to dispel that notion and I congratulate all members of the committee, including our Seanad colleagues Senators Fitzgerald, Corrigan, Feeney and Alex White, on their contribution. I also congratulate the Minister of State for being so proactive with this issue. I hope he will make the referendum a priority. I am encouraged by the fact there is €3 million set aside in this year's Estimates for a constitutional referendum and I very much hope that such a referendum will be held this year. It would be fitting for the Minister of State to be able to look back and say he was at the forefront of the campaign for such a referendum.

The publication of the Ryan and Murphy reports last year brought a new urgency and impetus to the issue of children's rights in this country. Both reports illustrated starkly what can happen when children's voices are ignored and deliberately stifled. We heard the harrowing accounts of the horrific abuse that children can be subjected to when they are relegated to a low priority in our society. That is what this amendment is about, rebalancing our priorities and for the first time making a positive statement of the rights of children as individuals to have their welfare regarded as a primary consideration. For example, the proposed new article 42.1.2 requires that the State recognises the natural and imprescriptible rights of all children and undertakes, as far as practicable, to protect and vindicate those rights. This clear statement that the State has a duty to vindicate the rights of the child is a welcome affirmation that children, just like adults, enjoy human rights which the State is duty-bound to uphold.

As we move ever closer to a referendum on this issue, the debate will intensify over the need for such a referendum and I would like to take a few moments to address a few of the issues that have arisen in recent discussions. The debate will certainly not be helped by a sensationalist approach such as that employed by journalist John Waters, when he wrote recently that the only "equality" provided by the amendment would be the equal right of all parents to have their children "snatched by the State".

Mr. Waters and others argue that this amendment will somehow undermine the status of the family unit and allow for inappropriate or disproportionate intervention on the part of the State. This is not the case. These concerns are met by the proposed wording, that State intervention shall be "by proportionate means, as shall be regulated by law". The emphasis is on supporting families in their responsibilities to their children, and the removal of children from their parents will be a last resort.

Also, Article 42.4 addresses the concerns with the existing Article 42.5 by setting a new threshold, based on proportionality, for State intervention in the family to protect children. The provision makes clear that children are entitled to State support regardless of their family status and represents a major advance in the relationship between children, their parents and the State. Rather than bringing more children into care, this provision suggests that the removal of a child from the family should only occur where a no less invasive measure would suffice.

It is worth noting that in her most recent annual report, Children's Ombudsman Emily Logan remarked that out of the 810 complaints received in her office in 2008, not one of them emanated from a conflict between the best interests of the child and the rights of parents. Ms. Logan very much supports the proposed amendment and is not looking for the State to supplant parents but to respond "in a proportionate way, one that will support, not punish families in difficulty".

The new amendment is a substantial improvement on the amendment originally contained in the Government's 2007 Bill. With all-party support in the Houses of the Oireachtas and the support of groups, organisations and individuals who daily and with extraordinary commitment work to help and protect children, it can be successfully incorporated into our Constitution with substantial public support in the required referendum. I urge the Minister of State and indeed his Government colleagues to make the holding of this referendum a priority for 2010.

There is an ethical obligation on us as law makers to put the interests of our children at the very heart of our Constitution. Bringing about such a change to our Constitution requires a certain amount of idealism on all of our parts. Without such idealism we have no direction, we are just angry and disillusioned people doing nothing more productive than complaining. Some of us cannot imagine a future without strife and so cannot develop a map to guide us there. We now have in our hands the map to a better place for our children at least and we should have the courage to take our children there as soon as possible.