In four adoption cases before the High Court, the fathers of the children could not be notified that their children were to be adopted by other .jpg)
men because the fathers are unknown.
The usual procedure is that the fathers are told if their children are to be adopted but this was impossible in these cases.
The Irish Times reports: “The mothers, not in court, made declarations stating that their children were produced through one-night encounters with men they did not know.
“They said they met the men in bars or nightclubs in Ireland and, in one case, abroad. They had the encounters under the influence of alcohol and only knew the first name of the man involved, could not recall a name or had not been given a name”.
Social workers said they believed the testimony of the women.
According to The Irish Times, one mother spoke of “her sadness that one of her children would not have access to information about her father while her other children would.”
In each case the partners of the women were seeking to adopt the children concerned.