Two cases often get used to justify inserting a more expansive definition of the rights of the child into the Constitution. Both are abuse cases, namely the Kilkenny Incest case and the Kelly Fitzgerald case. These have been used to criticise the protection our Constitution gives the family and to criticise the high wall Irish social attitudes have allegedly built around the family and which supposedly make it harder for the State to intervene in families in order to protect children.

Last night Iona director David Quinn debated the issue of same sex civil unions on RTE discussion show Questions and Answers. There were some interesting comments from one of the panelists, Maureen Gaffney. Although she supports the idea of same sex civil unions, here is what she had to say about marriage:

The British government is introducing compulsory sex education for primary school children which will begin at the age of five.

Last week Ombudsman Emily O’Reilly pointed out the anomaly that the social welfare code recognises cohabiting couples and the tax code does not. It was reported that she described this as ‘unfair discrimination’. She did not, in fact, do that, and she would be outside her powers if she did. All her office can do is point out discrepancies between how one Government department and another treats a given issue or category of people.

When finances are tight, and they are ultra-tight at present, every cent of public expenditure has to be absolutely justified and properly costed. What will it cost to give same-sex couples the same tax benefits as married couples? No-one really knows but a response given last Dail term to Leo Varadkar by Brian Cowen when he was still Minister for Finance throws some light on the matter.

Crèches according to many experts are not suitable for children under three years of age. Because of high mortgages and tax equalisation, mums and dads have little choice but to use group care.

Canada has a system of thought police tribunals that are dignified with the name of ‘Human Rights Commissions’ (HRCs). They were established a number of years ago and are used to target and punish so-called ‘hate speech’.

A Christian group, the Christian Institute (CI), which makes the case for religious freedom in the UK, has won a landmark case against internet giant Google. The group had attempted to place an ad about abortion on the popular search engine, but Google refused to take the ad, saying that its policy disallowed the advertising of sites that mixed “abortion and religion-related content”. But the two groups have come to what CI have described as "an amicable settlement". Google have accepted the ads.

David Cameron's speech to the Conservative Party conference on Wednesday yet again touted the importance of family and marriage. Below we have posted the relevant extracts from his talk.

In his piece about Sarah Palin and the always contentious issue of working mothers David Quinn seems to be suggesting that liberals are adopting a fundamentally different position to the one they're used to on working motherhood, i.e. that they are condemning her for not being a stay-at-home mother when usually, he suggests, they think all mothers should be out working. As one of those liberals (and a stay-at-home father) this seems to me to be addressing the issue in the black and white manner of which he later accuses critics of conservatism.

The Broadcasting Complaints Commission (BCC) decision to ban another Veritas ad highlights yet again the highly restrictive rules on religious advertising. To get a feel for just how restrictive these rules are, one need only look at the text of the banned ad.

The following is from a homily delivered by Cardinal Keith O’Brien on January 1, 2006 Scotland was then debating same-sex civil partnerships and the Bishops were doing their best to fight attempts to introduce them by the Scottish Assembly. In the end they failed, but it wasn’t for want of good arguments.

Last year, to great fanfare, The Irish Times announced that financial freedom is the single thing most valued by women. Guess what? It is also the single thing most valued by men.

The following passage is extracted from a recent column by Jennifer Roback Morse. It sets out very succinctly one very dramatic way in which heterosexual marriage differs from same-sex marriage in that the former arises organically and requires very little if any State assistance in the strictest sense, but once same-sex marriage involves children it requires very considerable State intervention.

The choice of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate has raised two issues of ‘culture war’ controversy namely teenage pregnancy and working mothers. Let’s leave aside the teenage mother question and concentrate instead on working mums.

A while back, I blogged here about a story in the London Times suggesting that there was a split in the upper echelons of the newly resurgent Tory Party about the issue of marriage.

The last Quarterly Labour Force Survey was released by the CSO yesterday and for those who like this sort of thing it made interesting reading. The media typically focus on what the survey reveals about the overall employment trend, but it also contains data that receives much less attention including data relating to labour force participation by mothers with dependent-age children.

Prospect magazine is a monthly journal of the left published in Britain. It is always worth reading because the articles are usually reflective, contrary viewpoints are allowed in its pages and are normally respected.