David Cameron has reneged on his promise to support marriage and tackle family breakdown, and instead unfairly penalised middle-class parents, a leading UK think-tank has said. Mr Cameron made backing marriage a centrepiece of his stance as the Leader of the Opposition, promising to make Britain “the most family-friendly country in Europe”. However, an audit...
Nearly half of Ireland’s grandparents – the so-called ‘granny-nanny’ – assist their adult children by providing care to their grandchildren, according to a new study. The Trinity College research, entitled The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing Elderly (TILDA) shows that 47 pc of grandparents in the over-50 category provide childcare to their grandchildren. For grandparents...
A survey carried out by the Irish Pharmacy Union (IPU) shows that more than two over-the- counter requests are made every week in pharmacies for the Morning-After-Pill (MAP), also called ‘emergency contraception’ . The survey, published yesterday at the IPU National Pharmacy Conference in Kilkenny, suggests that 85pc of pharmacists have been asked for the...
Children whose parents have happy relationships with each other do better in life, irrespective of social class or race, according to a new US study. The figures also showed that children in married families where parents were in a happy relationship tended to do better than those raised in alternative family structures. The study, carried...
All schoolgirls should be taught “how to say no” to sex as part of a new sex education curriculum, according to a prominent UK Conservative MP. Speaking in the Commons, Nadine Dorries said that society was “saturated in sex”. She said schoolchildren were being shown how to put condoms on bananas and self-diagnose diseases but...
Environment Minister Phil Hogan (pictured) has said that the Government will set up a Constitutional Convention “in the next few weeks”. The Convention will look at issues such as same-sex marriage, removing the clause on women in the home, and removing the offence of blasphemy from the Constitution. Speaking on RTE’s News At One programme...
Religious freedom faces a “critical challenge” in today’s society, according to one of the Vatican’s most influential academics. Harvard law professor Mary Ann Glendon, the president of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, said that, in some jurisdictions with a long tradition of religious freedom, there were growing threats. Professor Glendon said: “Even in countries...
Christian lawyers in the UK are promising to step up their campaign against the marginalisation of religion in society as they prepare to fight more than 50 different cases. The Christian Legal Centre (CLC) pledged to stand up against what it feels is the growing problem of traditional Christian views being “silenced or sidelined” in...
The European Commission has apologised for printing more than three million school diaries containing no reference to Easter or Christmas, but has rejected calls for the diaries to be recalled. The diaries note Sikh, Hindu, Muslim and Chinese festivals, as well as highlighting ”Europe Day” which falls on May 9, but failed to acknowledge any...
Ireland has the one of the highest rates of lone parenthood in the developed world according to a new report from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). The report, called ‘Doing Better for Families’ highlights family poverty which has a strong link to lone parenthood. Britain has the highest percentage of lone parents...
