The Equality (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2015, aimed at weakening the right of religious-run schools to protect their ethos from staff who would undermine it, has passed the final report stage.
The Bill is designed to ensure that gay staff in schools can speak about their relationships in the same way as other staff.
If subsequently passed by the Dáil into law, the Bill will directly affect Section 37(1) of the Employment Equality Act which currently protects the right of religious-run schools to dismiss staff whose actions contravene an institution’s ethos.
Passage of the Bill was welcomed by gay lobby groups. Speaking on behalf of the LGBT wing of Ireland’s largest teaching union, INTO, Anne Marie Lillis said: “LGB teachers can be secure in the knowledge that speaking about our families and our relationships, in the same way as our colleagues and that being gay or lesbian will have no bearing on job security or on prospects for promotion. When signed into law this legislation will end the threat of discrimination in primary schools based on sexual orientation.”
Sheila Nunn, general secretary of the largest teachers’ union in Ireland, the INTO, welcomed the passage of the Bill as “ victory for all teachers in our classrooms throughout the country”.
Meanwhile, Ireland’s Gender Recognition Bill has also passed its final report stage and now progresses to the Seanad.
Following a final submission of amendments in the Dáil, the Bill has taken a step closer to providing for Irish citizens who wish to legally ‘transition’ between genders.
According to the wording of the Bill: “Where a gender recognition certificate is issued to a person the person’s gender shall from the date of that issue become for all purposes the preferred gender so that if the preferred gender is the male gender the person’s sex becomes that of a man, and if it is the female gender the person’s sex becomes that of a woman.”
