Sharon Keogan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

This Commencement matter is on the non-commencement of section 6 of the Civil Registration (Amendment) Act 2014. This Act was passed by both Houses of the Oireachtas on 27 November 2014 and was signed into law on 4 December. As per section 1(3) of the Act, the Minister must commence certain sections. This last happened in 2020 with SI 550, which commenced sections 5, 7, 8 and 9. This was brought to my attention yesterday by the assistant registrar general of the Department. I was misled by a contradiction on the Irish Statute Book website regarding the commencement of these sections. Section 6 of the Act has not yet been commenced. It has been 3,240 days and the commencement order has not been given. I have submitted a Commencement matter so that we might hear why this is the case.

The sections in question relate to the registration of births and the naming of the children's parents on documents in cases where the parents are not married. It provides that it is the duty of both parents to comply with the registration of the birth of a child notwithstanding that they are not married to each other. Where the mother of the child attends alone she must provide information as to the father's name and contact details. Where the mother furnishes evidence and a statutory declaration that her spouse is not the father of the child the registrar must make responsible efforts to contact the spouse.Where parents fail to agree on the surname to be registered, a registrar may complete the registration by leaving the surname field blank or where a surname is already registered, leaving that surname in place. These are practical and common-sense provisions that were debated and voted in favour of almost nine years ago. They will also allow people in the future to be able to trace their lineage back, more importantly, to get in contact with estranged family if they wish to do so and engender greater certainty in the birth registration system.

I understand that an amending Bill is being drafted by the Department to correct a technical issue in section 6, causing it to reference subsection (1A) instead of subsection (1). If this assists in getting a section commenced, it is a welcome move, but why has it taken so long? I understand that legislative drafting is necessarily an exceedingly exact science and one that cannot be rushed, but nine years seems an awfully long time to wait for commencement. I hope the Minister of State will be able to shed some light on the matter.