Annie Hoey (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I second the Bill. I echo Senator Wall's thanks and welcome for the people in the Gallery. Maria, Johnny and Damien gave us an excellent briefing earlier and everyone has given so much of their personal time and experience to this issue. This is an issue that we cannot talk about in the abstract, up here in the legislative sky. These are real people, real families and real children who have been touched by tragedy, loss and death and are, quite frankly, being punished by this Government and by successive Governments for not being married. I think that is wrong and we in the Labour Party think that is wrong.

We are coming to the Government with legislation to deal with this issue. We are taking the advice of Mr. Justice Heslin, who said this can be dealt with legislatively. If the Minister is unable to accept this legislation today, there are alternative routes she can take through the social welfare protection Bill and through the community welfare service. We have done this before in Ireland, where we have recognised that there is a constitutional problem and we have found a way to deal with it before changing the Constitution. We did this with marriage equality. We brought in civil partnerships. It was a legislative framework we were able to use in order to deal with the issue and, later, we went to the people and we all saw how that worked out. There are ways this can be dealt with. We have laid out multiple ways today. I want to hear what the Minister has to say because this is not just a piece of legislation. We have offered a couple of solutions if she is interested in following through on any of them.

I will take a moment to reflect on what has happened in the past couple of weeks, particularly with regard to the case Johnny O'Meara took. The Labour Party and my colleague, Deputy Alan Kelly, were working on this legislation before that court case but it has driven home exactly what it is we are doing. Johnny O'Meara was with his partner Michelle for 20 years. She had an untimely death. They had three children together. In the court, Mr. Justice Heslin recognised that Johnny and Michelle and their children had been a loving family, that they were a family, but because of our archaic system and laws and their interpretation of what a family is, they could not be recognised as such when Johnny sought what was not an enormous request. I think anyone would agree with that. All he wanted was a bereavement grant of €8,000 and a widow and widower's pension; something to help support the family unit and children. There are often children in these cases who are being punished. It is State-sanctioned punishment because of decisions their parents made. Their parents should not be forced into a decision to get married. I often hear people, particularly among my peers and colleagues, saying they have no interest in marriage and are just doing it for tax purposes or some other reason. That is not how we should treat something like this. We should not be forcing people into a marriage, if that is not what they want to do. This piece of paper should not define what their family unit is. It should not define who they are or what their family unit is. It is a throwback.

I keep thinking about how archaic this feels. It feels like something that belongs in our past, not something that belongs in the Ireland we have today in 2022. We have had enormous social change. We have been a beacon across the world for progressive social change and yet we have this farcical interpretation of what a family is. We have decided that a family is based on this legal sacrament. It came from a sacrament. We have decided that a family is only defined based on that and not based on the loving and bonded unit people create for themselves. It is so unprogressive. It does not make sense to me in a country where we recognise marriage equality and we have trans rights and all of these things and people can do what they want with their bodies. However, families cannot be recognised because they have not participated in the sacrament of marriage. That is wrong. We have a system where the family unit is recognised and couples are jointly assessed for various social welfare benefits. They go in and are assessed as a unit and as a cohabiting couple. A lot of the people we are talking about here have had lifelong commitments to each other. The people I have spoken to have been together for 38 years, over 20 years, 32 years and 22 years. Those are significant amounts of time for people to have spent together. They are life partners. At the end of that, if one of the partners passes away, they are left with this legal mess. There is no reason for that legal mess to exist. As I have said, we have put forward legislation that can deal with that and there are other ways it can be dealt with as well.

When we were talking earlier, we had conversations about what this means for families. I might take a moment, if the Acting Chair will indulge me, to talk about some of the people who have spoken to me about their families and the family unit they have created over time. One person said:

My partner and I of over 20 years jointly own our own home. As cohabiting couples do not have the same rights in regard to property inheritance tax, we find ourselves forced to marry as we are unable to afford the 33% inheritance tax bill we [c]ould incur in the event of one of us passing away. We find it confusing and insulting that we do not have a right to inherit our own home. This law is unfair and discriminatory and needs to be changed. We should have the right to choose whether or not we wish to marry and anything else is an infringement on our rights as citizens of this country.

For a country that has had such a strong campaign around choice in lots of different ways over the past few years, forcing people to make the choice to get married in order to be able to avail of certain benefits seems anathema to that. Another person spoke to me whose partner recently passed. They had no idea they would not be entitled to the widow's pension. They were horrified they had no access to it. This person has three children and they did not know why. I spoke to the person on the phone and they were baffled. They just do not understand why the family unit that they and their partner had created, the loving family unit they had set up, was not entitled to this pension. They had a home, three kids, a dog and all those things. They had built a life together, the life they dreamed of having, and they just do not understand why that life is not recognised. It is wrong that that life is not recognised. It is wrong that that family unit is not recognised and it is wrong that there is a State-sanctioned punishment of that family unit. I will keep saying that because I think that is what it is.

I do not want to get overly emotional about this. A lot of us have spoken to people about this and it is a difficult topic. When people come to us who are affected by not being able to get a bereavement grant or a widow's or widower's pension, it is because they have lost their life partner. They have lost someone they love. They have lost a father or mother to their children. They have lost the person they had created a life with. For all other intents and purposes they are a family, except when it comes to this small State support and a basic recognition of their family unit. It is important that we think about the message we are sending today. By kicking this down the line, what are we saying to these families?What are we saying to the families here today about the value of their family unit and the value of the life that they led with that partner who is no longer here? I think it is really important that we think about what we are saying to them. It is not good enough to tell those families that because they are missing a marriage certificate - a piece of paper - they are somehow lacking in something as a family. Some people I have spoken to are more of a family than any of the other families I have dealt with. They are more committed to each other, they have created a life together and they have shown so much love and strength in having to fight this. I want to commend Johnny on the work that he has done, and on taking that case and really putting it to the Government. The judge said that this can be dealt with legislatively. I am asking the Minister to outline to us how she is going to deal with it legislatively.

If Members will indulge me, I will tell one more story of a woman who spoke to me. She stated:

My partner of 32 years passed away in April [2022]. We had 3 daughters together and [I could not believe] I had no access to a widow’s pension and no rights when it came to settling his estate. [I am devastated]. This is so wrong and something should be done.

We are asking the Minister, on behalf of many of those families and couples, to do something.