I rarely agree with the Government, but I will be voting “Yes-Yes” in the upcoming Irish Constitutional Referendums on Family and Care – because it finally gives recognition to people who are the human equivalents of drones in a bee colony.
Everyone knows someone like this: a sister, aunt or uncle who minds the kids / elderly parents in return for a roof over their head. They sacrifice their social life, education and career opportunities to fill the gaps left by a society in which couples with children need to work full time just to afford a mortgage.
Their families may not intend to treat them like this – but these people are the Cinderellas of the community. Parents receive supports such as Child Benefit, married couples can rely on generous tax exemptions for sharing bank accounts / passing on homes. Single, childless people keep falling through the cracks.
On top of that, there are too many single-parent colonies masquerading as multiple families, where (for example) a serial monogamist male impregnates various females [I am deliberately using the language of zoologists here because these people really should use a stud book to keep track of their romantic lives]. Each new “single-mum family” gets a State-subsidised three-bedroom home – and “Daddyo” gets one too, so his kids can come for sleepovers. This is why there are kids with multiple addresses: their mum’s, their half-siblings’, their dad’s, their step-dad’s… And these kids are usually living with their grandparents while their parents make more babies with more partners. Meanwhile our homeless community is growing.
The Conservatives who say that these referendums will discourage marriage are missing the point: this won’t stop anyone getting married – indeed, it will disincentivise commitment-phobic people from baby-farming and expecting the State to pick up the tab.
While it may result in legal status being given to polygamy, isn’t it better to have polygamous unions registered and their children counted as part of one family unit than falsely identified as multiple families?
As for the claim that a “Yes” in the second part of the Referendum will somehow force families to care for their loved ones… If it does, that will certainly hit some families hard – the kind who, despite being able-bodied and mentally capable, dump their elderly parents in nursing homes instead of minding them. But I think there will always be vulnerable people who, for whatever reason, can’t be / don’t want to be minded by their blood relatives, and this is where a “Yes” in the first part of the Referendum will kick in: the meaning of “Family” will be broadened to include all “durable relationships”, so they can choose friends…or indeed just be a family of one, with full family status and all the rights that entails. This will provide reassurance and protection to people who have legitimate cause to be estranged from their blood relatives.
Of course a referendum is not legislation, nor should it be. “Case law” will dictate how these changes are made in society (as Judge Marie Baker recently pointed out).
But a double-Yes is not a double-negative for society, as many are claiming; it won’t take anything away. And it will give the most vulnerable more leverage to claim their rights as human beings. It is a very civilising referendum; it will make us more human. I’m saying Yes-Yes.