The Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) has attacked the Iona Institute over its attitude to the Civil Partnership Act.

In the editorial page of its quarterly newsletter, Rights News, ICCL director Mark Kelly (pictured) attacked The Iona Institute’s claim that marriage as a social institution is bound up with a child’s right to a mother and father.

“As if the sole purpose of marriage is procreation. As if marriages that do not produce children are lesser marriages,” Kelly said.

He went on to claim that the the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child said that, for a child to flourish, it should “grow up in an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding”.

“There’s nothing there about the gender, sexual orientation or marital status of the people who constitute the family,” Kelly added.

In fact, Article 7 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child says that “The child…shall have the right from birth to a name, the right to acquire a nationality and, as far as possible, the right to know and be cared for by his or her parents”.

The editorial also suggested that The Iona Institute’s stance in favour of children’s rights in this instance was not genuine, suggesting that its questioning of the proposed children’s rights referendum indicated as much.

Kelly said: “If the Iona Institute really believed in children’s rights it would not be opposing calls by the Ombudsman for Children, Emily Logan, for a referendum to introduce express rights for children into our Constitution.”

In fact, The Iona Institute has not adopted a position in respect of a referendum and has simply warned that a children’s rights referendum should not give the State excessive power.

The editorial also praised Justice Minister Dermot Ahern for refusing to include a conscience clause in the Civil Partnership Act.

Minister Ahern, Kelly said, was “to be applauded…..for his refusal to water down the civil partnership bill at the behest of the bishops or their avatars”.