The Irish Human Rights Commission (IHRC) has said that any referendum on childrens’ rights 
should “ include an express reference that the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration and be justiciable”.
In its report [1] to the United Nations on Ireland’s human rights record as part of the UN’s process of Universal Periodic Review (UPR), the IHRC said it supported recommendations of the Ombudsman for Children in her report to the UPR.
Concerns have previously been expressed by legal experts such as Gerard Hogan that concept of ‘best interests’ could make it too easy for the State to intervene in family life.
Ireland’s review before the Human Rights Council is due in October.
The alternative wordings produced by the Joint Commitee last year and the last Government this year both included a reference to the “best interests” of the child. However, the in the case of the Government’s wording, the phrase applied to a much more limited range in circumstances.
The report also referred to the issue of denominational education, saying that “Parents and older children (in accordance with their level of maturity) should have adequate choice in the range of available denominational, non-denominational and multidenominational primary and post-primary schools”.
It added that this would include “further State policy on how religion and belief are addressed in and beyond the classroom”.
The report refers to an IHRC submission [2] to the UN’s Committee on Equality and Racial Discrimination made last year.
The report said that the practice in new Vocational Educational Committee primary schools of teaching children their religion in separate group did not take into account “the needs of children who are being brought up without a religious ethos”.
The report also recommended that the Goverment needed to “clarify” the situation of would-be teachers “to ensure persons of non-faith or minority religious backgrounds are not deterred from training or taking up employment as teachers in the State”.
It also referred to section 37 of the Employment Equality Act, which allows schools to choose staff to prevent an employee or prospective employee from undermining the religious ethos of the institution.
However, the report makes no direct recommendations regarding this provision.
It also refers to Section 12 of the Employment Equality Act 1998 which permits bodies providing professional teacher training to primary school teachers to apply to the Minister for Education and Science for orders permitting them to reserve places on their course to ensure the availability of teachers in denominational schools and the maintenance of the “religious ethos” of denominational primary schools.
No recommendation is made in respect of this provision either.
The report also recommends that Article 41.2 of the Constitution, which recognises the role of women in the home, be replaced by “gender-inclusive language”.
It says that Article 41.2 “continues to perpetuate stereotypical attitudes towards the role of women in Irish society” and urges the Government to establish a specified timeframe for its replacement.