Róisín Garvey (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

On behalf of the Green Party, I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Bill. Under the then Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, our colleague, Senator McDowell, the 27th amendment to the Constitution, which was passed in 2004, removed the automatic right to citizenship upon birth. Once it had been passed, children born in Ireland lost the constitutional right to citizenship upon birth. The amendment instead gives the Oireachtas power to legislate for routes to citizenship and naturalisation. I say "well done" to the Senator for that. I remember my son was five years old at the time and I put him in the shoes of children who were born here but whose right to citizenship was removed.

In early 2004, the Green Party was the first political party to announce its opposition to the referendum. We campaigned fiercely for a "No" vote from the outset. Our campaign called out the Government proposal for what it was - a debasing of politics at the expense of the most vulnerable people in Irish society. We also pointed to the rushed nature of the referendum, arguing that the Government had not devoted enough time to a debate on the matter and that its claims that citizenship tourists were putting hospitals under pressure did not stand up to scrutiny. Now we see that those very migrants are the people working as nurses or doctors on the front line.

I am glad to say that the Green Party was not the only party to voice grave concerns about the referendum. We were joined by the Labour Party and Sinn Féin in campaigning for a "No" vote. It is a very happy day to be in the Seanad when one sees all Senators in agreement on this issue. The then Human Rights Commission, chaired by Maurice Manning, voiced serious concerns regarding the substance of the referendum and the manner in which it was developed and put to the people.

Thanks to all the gods, we have evolved since 2004 in a significant way, whereby we see cross-party support from every party, big, small and none, such that all Members agree that the amendment to the Constitution is ridiculous. I welcome all the work that has been done to date by the Minister for Justice, Deputy McEntee, and my colleague, the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, Deputy O'Gorman, on this issue. The Bill has been fast-tracked. It is 2020 and the time is now. I have worked with hundreds of schools and have seen children from all over the world who are more Irish than the Irish themselves. They play the accordion and have better Irish than I do. It is ridiculously wrong to think that those kids are not Irish in every way. I again commend Senator Bacik on bringing forward the Bill.