The two largest political parties, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil have said they would not favour a referendum to change the Constitutional definition of marriage. In response to questions from The Irish Catholic, both parties said they favoured retaining the current position on marriage.

However, Labour, who are likely to form a coalition government with Fine Gael, favour a referendum to change the Constitution to allow for same-sex marriage. It also favours and same-sex adoption.

Fine Gael also favour improving the position of stay-at-home mothers in respect of tax individualisation. Fianna Fáil does not favour easing the effects of their tax individualisation policy, which penalises single income families by up to €6,240 a year.

In Government, Fianna Fáil pushed through the Civil Partnership Act, which gives same-sex couples who register virtually all of the same rights as married couples, including tax and pension rights. Fine Gael backed this position.

On denominational schools, Fine Gael told the Irish Catholic that they support the right of such schools to exist. However, they were unclear as to whether denominational schools should retain the right to set their own admissions policies. They also refused to state their position on retaining Section 37 of the Employment Equality Act, which allows schools to protect their ethos in respect of who they hire.

Without this section, schools could be forced to hire people who might undermine a school’s ethos. For example, Catholic schools could be forced to hire teachers whose lifestyles were in direct conflict with Church teaching on sex and marriage.

Fianna Fáil said they favoured the retention of Section 37, and the right of denominational schools to teach all aspects of their faith, including sexual morality. However, they were less clear as to whether denominational schools should be allowed to admit pupils of their own faith ahead of other faiths.

They told the Irish Catholic they favoured schools having this right “provided no applicant is being discriminated against”.

Labour also says it would allow denominational schools to continue to exist, but it is committed to heavily amending Section 37, and favours forcing schools to hire openly homosexual teachers, which would make it impossible for Catholic schools to teach Catholic sexual morality in full.

On the issue of freedom of conscience, all parties opposed adding a conscience clause to the Civil Partnership Act. However, Fine Gael says it supports the right of faith-based organisations to receive State-funding without compromising their ethos.

Fianna Fáil is more ambiguous on this issue. Asked specifically whether it would support funding Cura, the Catholic pregnancy counselling agency, if it had an ethical objection to carrying out some aspect of HSE Crisis Pregnancy policy, Fianna Fáil said: “In the event of an agency declining to provide information out of a moral, philosophical or conscientious basis, we believe funding could still be provided, where the agency is of the opinion that fair guidelines of eligibility, transparency and most importantly the welfare of women in crisis are taken into account.”

Labour also say they support the right of faith-based organisations to receive State-funding without compromising their ethos.