Children’s referendum will transfer rights to State

FOLLOWING on Hermann Kelly’s excellent articles (Irish Examiner, February 22 and March 9), it is important to reiterate that the proposed referendum on the ‘rights’ of the child is but a smokescreen for the real issue at heart.

The referendum is an insidious and pernicious attempt by the Government and organisations such as the Children’s Rights Alliance to continue their campaigns to wrest control of and undermine the authority of the natural family.

If adopted, this referendum would allow the State to forcibly take children from their parents if the State judges that the parent has failed the child in any physical or moral way.