Sir, – Prof William Binchy makes some rather unusual suggestions ("Same-sex referendum Yes would affect child welfare laws", Opinion & Analysis, May 12th). He suggests that if the marriage referendum is passed that the Oireachtas will not be able to pass legislation giving priority to heterosexual married couples, when deciding who should care for children. I am at a loss to know why the Oireachtas would want to draw up a list of priorities and what that list might look like. Who would be second on the list – would it be heterosexual couples, who are not married but who are thinking of getting married, then would it be heterosexual single men or would it be heterosexual single women and would this be followed by single gay women or single gay men, etc? There is no such list now and single people and couples, whether heterosexual or homosexual, can foster, adopt, care for and raise children. At present the priority in any decision regarding the care and upbringing of a child is what is in the best interests of any particular child. It is not the marital status, or lack of it, or the gender preference of the child's carers that is the priority and this has been confirmed in Article 42A of the Constitution.
Married couples have a limited right to procreate. That right does not extend to the State having to provide assisted human reproduction or surrogacy services to any couple or individual. Assisted human reproduction services are regulated by the Children and Family Relationships Act, 2015 and the passing of the referendum will not affect those statutory requirements.
The Oireachtas has yet to regulate the provision of surrogacy services. In the heads of Bill, which were drafted by the previous minister for justice, one of the couple, seeking to avail of surrogacy services, would have to be genetically connected to the child. This would apply to both heterosexual and same- sex couples, hence, the child would be raised by either the child’s father or mother. This is not very different from many of the family types that exist in Ireland. The state cannot be required to provide surrogacy services to any couple as, to do so, would mean that the state would have to provide women who would carry someone else’s child for nine months.
I agree that the passing of the referendum will bring considerable social and legal changes but these will be for the better. It will mean that all the children of the State will grow up knowing that they are entitled to the same respect from the State in their sexual preferences and the manner in which they wish to confirm their relationships. – Yours, etc,
CATHERINE FORDE,
Dublin 6.
Sir, – Alison Hamilton and Colm Jordan (May 13th) write: "Voting Yes would not change the way civil marriages are registered by law nor have implications on property, taxation or succession laws. Civil marriage stays the same. The only question we must answer on May 22nd is whether or not marriage is open to all." This is correct insofar as the immediate implication of a Yes vote on May 22nd would be an extension of marriage rights to a new class of couples, rather than an explicit redefinition of marriage itself.
However, a Yes vote implicitly redefines the meaning of marriage and family, insofar as it gives a union between two men or two women the same constitutional protection and standing as a union between a man and a woman, provided they are married. This will prevent the State from extending any special rights to heterosexual married couples that they do not also extend to homosexual married couples. It opens the door to a constitutional right to adoption by same-sex couples, to surrogacy becoming a routine way of bringing a child into the world (to satisfy the procreative needs of homosexual couples), and to the deliberate placing of children in homes where they lack the presence of either a father or a mother (otherwise we are “discriminating” against same-sex couples). So the question we must answer on May 22nd is not just whether marriage is “open to all,” but whether we want to effectively enshrine same-sex adoption in our Constitution, whether we want to normalise surrogacy as a method of procreation, and whether we want to give a constitutional imprimatur to the choice by adoption and surrogacy agencies to deprive children of a mother or a father. – Yours, etc,
DAVID THUNDER,
Pamplona, Spain.
Sir, – My fellow UCC alumnus, historian John A Murphy (May 13th) has expressed his intention to vote No in the upcoming referendum. He describes the potential outcome, recognising both same-sex and different-sex marriages as "indispensable to the welfare of the Nation and the State" (Article 1.2), as "grotesque nonsense". In doing so, I fear, he has missed the point.
Marriage is an ancient institution, predating many of our other social institutions by many centuries in one form or another. In that time, it has changed in many ways; the more modern elements of the union that we take for granted, such as the necessity of romantic love and the absolute consent of both parties involved, would be utterly unrecognisable from the arrangements made by men for their sons and daughters to protect property and inheritance rights in years gone by. Why did these changes happen? They happened because the importance of marriage in society was recognised; it was recognised as too important not to change it in order to keep its relevance in a changing society. In the contemporary era, where we define marriage more through the recognition of love and consent rather than property and procreation, the true "grotesque nonsense" is to deny it to any couple meeting those criteria. That, I feel, is reason enough to vote Yes. – Yours, etc,
LUKE FIELD,
Dublin 8.
A chara, – It is a pity that John A Murphy failed to follow his own logic. Supporting the establishment of UCC’s LGBT Society in the 1990s is entirely commensurate with supporting the marriage equality referendum in 2015. If one genuinely believes in equality for LGBT people, whether as young students beginning to find their way in the world or as mature adults shaping their lives, then everything flows from that simple premise. The constitutional protections for the family that Prof Murphy describes are precisely those which LGBT couples seek. To my mind, it is “grotesque” to assume that a loving, committed relationship between two LGBT people is of a lesser moral status than that between two straight people. Because it is not – and because I witness this daily among my friends and within my community – I will be voting Yes. – Is mise,
CORMAC SHERIDAN,
Dublin 7.
Sir, – Prof John A Murphy makes a cogent, clear and rational case, from a secular and non-religious point of view, for voting No in the redefinition of marriage referendum. As a person of both reason and faith I fully agree with his analysis and his conclusion that the proposed change would amount to a “grotesque nonsense”. For that reason I, like him, will be voting No. –Yours, etc,
PADDY BARRY,
Killiney, Co Dublin.
Sir, – It is strange that the voices concerned with the perceived threat to the rights of children that a Yes result in the forthcoming marriage equality referendum might bring are the same voices that campaigned against the recognition of the rights of children in the referendum of 2012? – Yours, etc,
ADRIAN MULLAN,
Rathoe, Co Carlow.
A chara, – A recurring reason being cited for voting No is concern about children being brought up in a family without their biological parents. But this argument is fundamentally flawed because children are already being brought up in same-sex, adopted and single parent households without both biological parents. Children will continue to be brought up in these families regardless of the outcome of the referendum. A No vote will not achieve this idea of a perfect society where all children are raised by both of their biological parents. A No vote will simply tell these families (including their children) that they are too different to be treated with equal constitutional protection. Surely our children deserve to be raised in a better world – one where all families are valued equally. Please vote Yes. – Is mise,
JENNIFER BURKE,
Stillorgan, Co Dublin.
Sir, – The Mothers and Fathers Matter group’s latest poster proclaims that two men cannot replace a mother’s love. If two men can’t do it, it seems to follow that one man can’t either. So widower or single father with child arrangements are to be equally ruled out, if you agree with its views. This seems rather insulting to those people. In the interests of accuracy, the group should immediately be renamed “Mothers Matter”. – Yours, etc,
BRENDAN HENEGHAN,
Dublin 6W.