Fergus Finlay, Chief Executive of Barnardos, has claimed that “a Constitutional referendum is urgently needed” to protect children. In a statement, he said he was dismayed by signals from the Government indicating that they were backing away from holding such a referendum on the issue of “children's rights”.

The “ prevailing culture and social agenda” being pursued by the EU appears to be predominantly secular and hostile to religion, according to the Catholic Primate of Ireland, Cardinal Sean Brady.

A newly created EU human rights body, the Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA), has called for binding EU regulations to force member states to legalise same-sex marriage.

Pensioners outnumber children in the UK for the first time as more and more people live longer, according to new figures.

Parents in the UK are facing a severe shortage of childminders after bureaucracy prompted thousands to abandon the profession. According to new Government figures, more than 8,000 people have given up offering child care in England in just four years, more than a tenth of the total.

Children from bigger families are happier, healthier and more successful, according to a new report from British think tank Civitas. The study also suggests that the middle-classes are made to feel that large families impact negatively on the environment and damage their careers.

Forty per cent of married women with dependent children stay at home to look after them, according to new labour force figures from the CSO.

The INTO have described calls by Fine Gael for immigrants to be separated from other students until they can speak English as 'discriminatory, inequitable and deeply flawed'. They have also suggested that the proposal could be challenged legally.

An article in next month's Intercom magazine has condemned the “uncontrolled use of AHR [Assisted Human Reproductive] technology” saying that this could “lead to unforeseeable consequences for civil society”.

London has been dubbed “the divorce capital of the world”, according to one leading UK family lawyer. The city is awarded the title because England is thought to be “the best divorce jurisdiction” for foreign claimants, according to James Turner, QC, a counsel involved in top family law cases.

Dutch authorities are now giving de facto recognition to polygamous marriages, according to a report in Dutch newspaper, NRC Handelsblad. Although polygamy is banned in the Netherlands, the marriages of Muslims who have several wives are recognised by Dutch authorities.

Professor Robert Winston, one of the UK's top IVF experts, has said that fertility clinics are ignoring a more successful fertility treatment in favour of IVF for commercial reasons.

The Government will not issue a directive to schools on the wearing of the Islamic hijab headscarf in schools, according to Minister of State for Integration Conor Lenihan. Mr Lenihan said that the wearing of the headscarf was “not an issue” in most schools.

The Department of Education said it would "consider" criticisms made yesterday by Chair of the Bishops' Commission on Education, Bishop Leo O'Reilly of the Department's claimed policy preference for multi-denominational education.

The Chair of the Bishops' Commission on Education, Dr Leo O'Reilly, has said the principle of parental choice must be central to education provision. Citing a poll conducted on behalf of the Iona Institute, he said that parents were overwhelmingly in favour of having the right to choose denominational education.

The Government is now looking at using legislation rather than a referendum to address concerns relating to children's rights, according to Minister for State for Children, Barry Andrews. In an interview with the Irish Times, the Minister indicated that he believed that issues such as the best interest of the child could be addressed through legislation.

Parents in receipt of the Lone Parent Allowance will be assigned welfare advisers within months of the birth of their children to help direct them towards training, education and work opportunities, under a new Government scheme.

A Labour MP has tabled a motion in Parliament that would eliminate the freedom of religious conscience of public servants. The move comes in the wake of a ruling last month in which a Christian marriage registrar who refused to carry out homosexual marriages was found to have been discriminated against on the grounds of religion.

Hundreds of Irishwomen are travelling to clinics across the Continent to receive IVF treatment using eggs donated from young European women.

Children who watch more than three hours of television a day have more behaviour problems than other children, according to a new study.

The study, which used data more than 30,000 6- to 11-year-olds from the US National Survey of Children’s Health (NSCH) found that children in middle childhood were especially likely to have behavior problems if they watched more than three hours of television a day and had low parental involvement.

According to the report, published by US-based think tank Child Trends, school-age children spend more time watching television than on any other activity except sleeping.

The report adds that “numerous studies have found an association between television viewing and negative childhood outcomes”. Citing guidelines issued by the American Academy of Pediatrics , it says that an excess of TV viewing by children leads aggressive behavior, poor educational attainment, and obesity.

However, it points out that parental involvement and the family environment, in particular, have been shown to offer protective effects for children. Research finds that children with parents who are supportive and nurturing have fewer behavior problems, it says.

Their study sample consisted of parents of 31,117 children between the ages of 6 and 11 who reported on their child’s television viewing habits, parent-child communication, parental knowledge of their child’s friends, and their child’s behavior problems.

The study found that families in which parents did not communicate very well with their children had greater proportions of children with high levels of behavior problems, compared with families in which parents reported communicating very well with their children (38 versus 21 percent for internalising behaviors and 48 versus 27 percent for externalising behaviors).

Furthermore, families in which parents knew only some or none of their child’s friends also had greater proportions of children with high levels of behavior problems, compared with families in which parents reported knowing all of their child’s friends (31 versus 21 percent for internalising behaviors and 39 versus 26 percent for externalising behaviors).

The authors admitted that their study did not take television program content into account. They acknowledged that some studies have found that the type of television viewed is an important predictor of children’s outcomes.

“For example, numerous reviews of qualitative and quantitative studies on the effects of television content have found associations between violent content and aggressive behavior., Other studies have found associations between educational TV programs and increased knowledge and more positive racial attitudes among children,” the report said.

07/08/08