Senator Ronan Mullen (pictured) has questioned the fairness and impartiality of the Constitutional Convention .jpg)
after it heavily backed same-sex marriage at the weekend.
Senator Mullen, a member of the Convention described the debate on the issue at the Convention as a “flawed process”. Government figures, including Tanaiste Eamon Gilmore, have welcomed the result.
However Senator Mullen, a delegate at the Convention, said there were a number of flaws which he believed weakened the ability of the Convention to gauge opinion properly.
Speaking after the vote, he said he had written to Convention organisers beforehand to express concern that documentation commissioned from various experts “was not inclusive of all the relevant issues and failed to be completely impartial”.
He added that the contribution of the invited expert on the impact of same-sex parenting could be interpreted to favour a particular side of the argument.
Senator Mullen said: “On an issue as sensitive as this, it may be difficult to find an analysis which everybody will regard as neutral. There will be criticisms from either side, depending on the direction in which published research appears to lean.
“A thorough presentation of the competing research would have served the convention better. We should have been enabled to judge the conflicting claims for ourselves, rather like a jury in a court case.”
Senator Mullen added that some of the comments made by the invited expert were more relevant to the issue of how gay people were treated in the past.
He said: “These comments had a big emotional impact, but were not relevant to some of the policy questions involved in same-sex marriage which were never fully debated.
“I think there was a real failure by the Convention organisers here.”
Senator Mullen also criticised the decision by the Convention chairperson, Mr Tom Arnold, not to put certain questions to delegates about including freedom of conscience clauses or provisions to enable the State to make distinctions to protect children’s best interests in adoption and assisted human reproduction.
“This had an editorialising effect,” he said.
Finally, Senator Mullen reported that some citizen members of the convention felt that they had been pressured by politician members at the tables to support a particular line.
“While the process was enjoyable and the convention team deserve credit for their organisation, in the end things had a stage-managed feel,” Senator Mullen said.
“I don’t think this format facilitates consideration of diverse views, including minority positions, because of the limitations of time and the element of peer pressure,” Senator Mullen concluded.
Meanwhile, it is understood that Fine Gael TDs want a referendum on the issue postponed to separate it completely from the timing of the abortion legislation.
The Coalition is expected to hold off on a gay-marriage referendum until later next year after the local and European elections.
The Government must, however, hold a full debate on the issue in the Oireachtas within four months of a report being drawn up.
Communications Minister Pat Rabbitte, pointed to the range of items the Government is already planning to put to the people.
Mr Rabbitte said he was not going to be “jettisoned into giving a deadline”.
The Minister even declined to commit to the referendum being put to the voters in the lifetime of this Government.