One is related to a party activist, one is an actor and one is a stock image, writes MARY MINIHAN
THREE CHILDREN have become the faces of the children’s rights referendum after their images were selected to feature in the posters of three of the largest groups promoting a Yes vote.
One child is the daughter of a Labour Party official and another was recruited from a modelling and acting agency, while the identity of the third remains a mystery.
The smiling redhead who appears on the Labour posters is Sarah McDowell (11), whose father Brian McDowell is the party’s national organiser.
Sarah, who is from Donaghmede in Dublin and attends Gaelscoil Míde in Kilbarrack, said she found it “strange” to see the posters which say “children should be seen and heard” hanging from lampposts all over town.
Although she will not be voting – “I’m too young” – Sarah’s interpretation of what the referendum is about chimes with the message on the poster: “I think that children should be heard when they speak and they shouldn’t be ignored.”
The little boy holding the big pencil who features in the Yes for Children posters is Matthew Lawless (6) from Greystones, Co Wicklow, who was recruited through the Fraser Models and Actors agency.
Matthew’s mother, Amanda, said lots of people who know her son could not connect him with the sad-faced child in the poster.
“A lot of people didn’t recognise him because he normally has a big smile on his face.
“He’s a very happy child,” she said.
Matthew, who attends St Kevin’s National School in Greystones, is keeping his feet on the ground despite his newfound fame.
“One of my friends wanted my autograph,” he laughed.
Yes for Children is an umbrella movement not associated with any political party, led by Barnardos, the Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (ISPCC), the Children’s Rights Alliance and other organisations including Campaign for Children.
The youngster who appears in the Fine Gael’s poster cannot be identified. The image of the lonely-looking boy hugging a teddy bear came from a stock photo library, iStockPhoto, where it is labelled “Sad child”.
The American photographer who took the picture, Joel Sorrell, said he was pleased to learn his picture was being used in the campaign.
He said the image was a “concept shot” intended to be used to illustrate the issue of vulnerable children.
He declined to discuss how the image was produced, saying he did not want to distract from its current usage.
Chris Cawley, co-founder of advertising agency Cawley Nea, who says he will be voting Yes, was struck by the contrasting messages behind the Fine Gael and Labour posters.
“The Fine Gael one is playing on the awful pain that we have within our society, and rightly so, about how children have been chronically abused.
“It’s Fine Gael saying, ‘We are the protectors’,” Mr Cawley said.
“The bright, red-haired Irish colleen is an attempt to put forward a positive, values-based image.
“It’s saying children should be seen and heard, so it’s about the rights of children and individuals and taking what I would say was a much more secular position within our society.”
Campaigners for the No vote have not erected posters to date.