The Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (ISPCC) has sounded a warning over children’s unsupervised access to the internet. Following a survey of young people and their internet habits, the organisation found that online activity goes largely unmonitored, placing children at risk. The ISPCC warned of an increase in the number of children engaging with strangers online. The survey further revealed that many children believe the purpose of social media is to insult others and that this is normal behaviour. ISPCC CEO Grainia Long said: “Evidence from our services shows the scale and nature of online activity by children and young people, and how much work is needed to keep them safe online. Cyber safety is the child protection issue of our time; we are only beginning to understand the scale and nature of harm and criminal behaviour towards children online.”

A South African court ruling on euthanasia which had broad implications for the country has been overturned on appeal. In 2015, the nation’s High Court ruled in favour of a man seeking to die by assisted suicide, signalling a challenge to the constitutional protection for the right to life. However, the plaintiff died before the court’s ruling could be enacted and the South African government then launched an appeal to the Appeals Court. That court has now ruled that “the claim ceased to exist once the applicant died before the order could be granted” and that euthanasia remains “illegal and prosecutable”. Reacting to the successful appeal, Justice spokesperson Mthunzi Mhaga said: “The Ministers of Justice and Minister of Health are relieved that the order was set aside given the far-reaching implications the judgment had on the constitutionally-entrenched right to life”.

A young child’s cognitive and social skills are considerably improved by spending more time with their mother between ages three and seven, a new study has shown. Published in the Economic Journal, the study by researchers at the University of Essex looked at the relationship between the time mothers spend with their children and the skills children go on to develop. “Our results emphasise that the time spent by mothers with their children has a noticeable influence on early child development,” said Prof. Marco Francesconi, one of the study authors.  Time spent engaging in educational activities, such as reading, between the ages of three and five with a mother who has been educated beyond the minimum school-leaving age, leads to an increase in verbal skills at age seven and significantly greater than achieved by children whose mothers are less well educated. The British government plans to extend free childcare to 30 hours per week for children aged three and four, but research published by the Institute for Fiscal Studies suggests that the measure will have limited impact on parents’ working patterns. The research found that increasing child care hours had no noticeable impact on fathers’ working patterns or those of mothers with other children under the age of four.

The Irish hierarchy has warned that repealing the constitutional protection for the unborn will change the principle that the right to life of all human beings is a fundamental entitlement. In a submission to the Citizen’s Assembly, the Bishops warn that any such repeal “would radically change the principle, for all unborn children and indeed for all of us, that the right to life is a fundamental human right”. They stressed their “firmly held belief, based on reason as well as faith, that there is no such thing as a human life without value” and rejected “the suggestion that any person can decide when it is time for another person to die”. The bishops further voiced concern at the language used in the debate on abortion availability in Ireland. “Words like ‘foetus’ and ‘embryo’ and ‘zygote’ have specific technical meanings. We question why, in public discourse, healthy unborn children are always referred to as ‘the baby’ while those who, in the opinion of some, do not measure up to expectations are routinely defined as the ‘foetus’ or the ‘embryo’?”

A teacher at a school in Canada has been sacked after a student took offence at his stated opposition to abortion. During a class on law and ethics at the unnamed school in British Columbia, the teacher illustrated a point by stating that “I find abortion to be wrong, but the law is often different from our personal opinions.” A female student subsequently took a complaint to school heads, demanding an apology for the offence she felt at the comment. Under threat of being fired, the teacher apologised for his comment and for offending a good student he liked. The student then complained that this was too personal and the teacher was sacked. According to reports, the school is known as “progressive” on LGBT issues and affords students the right to be ‘triggered’ by issues they find offensive and to walk out of class should this happen.

Ireland is experiencing an increased diversity of family types, according to a new study from researchers at Trinity College Dublin and Maynooth University. According to findings contained in ‘Family Rhythms’, the book resulting from interviews with 240 family members, while the commitment to the traditional family unit endures in Ireland, numerous types of family structure have evolved in line with the country’s changed economic and social reality. Among those findings are a greater reliance on the support of grandparents in child-rearing, greater involvement by fathers, but also division in educational achievement between single and two-parent families. In this latter category, children growing up in single-parent, female-headed families experience a distinct disadvantage against more affluent families who continue to dominate in the “concerted cultivation” of their children’s education, by deliberately investing in extra-curricular activities and grinds.

US legislators have been criticised for removing a religious freedom amendment from a bill after lobbying from secular groups. At the heart of the row was the Defence Authorisations Bill, which was being held up amid wrangles between Democrats and Republicans over the inclusion of the Russell Amendment, a device to prevent religious groups or charities being sanctioned for operating according to Christian principles. Democrats threatened to hold up the defence legislation unless the Russell element was dropped, a move backed by groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union. Reacting to the removal of Russell, Kristina Arriaga, executive director of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty said: “Because Congress ducked this important issue, more service providers will be unable to continue offering their critical services, services that are sometimes only offered by religious groups. It is the refugees, homeless, trafficking victims, veterans, and other vulnerable populations who will suffer the most from Congress’s choice to prioritise political expediency over principled governance.”

An Australian court has cleared the way for a five-year-old boy to undergo surgery in order to become more female. The parents of the child, identified only as Carla, had argued before the court that their child has always exhibited “stereotypically female” behaviour and never wanted to be referred to as male. The court ruled that Carla’s parents need no permission to arrange surgery for the boy, accepting medical arguments that without it, Carla’s physical and mental health would suffer.

A fresh attempt to have the Northern Ireland Assembly legislate for abortion has been introduced at Stormont. The move has been initiated through a Bill tabled by Alliance Party member and former NI justice minister David Ford, who is calling for abortion in cases where an unborn baby is terminally ill. Mr Ford previously tried to have such legislation voted through while serving as Justice Minister. Members of the Legislative Assembly have been lobbied repeatedly since 2013 to introduce abortion in Northern Ireland, an issue last voted on in February of 2016 when the measure was rejected by 59 votes to 40. Mr Ford’s Bill is expected to be examined and debated in 2017 as Stormont brings for its own proposals on abortion, arising from a Belfast High Court ruling of 2015 that the North’s abortion ban may be incompatible with human rights law.