Government can go to the people on one issue and win hands down

TWO opinion polls last week.

One commanded a lot of attention, the other very little.

And yet the one that wasn’t really noticed said a lot of interesting things.

Most publicised was, of course, the political opinion poll over the weekend in the Sunday Business Post. Labour people had been worried that all the attention given to Fine Gael over the previous couple of weeks, and the usual publicity surrounding government (which guarantees that Fianna Fáil’s activities get noticed), could have meant their party was somewhat out of the limelight.

There’s nothing a good political strategist hates more than to see his party being marginalised. You’ve got to be at the heart of the action.

They needn’t have worried. The people of Ireland, in their infinite wisdom, want to see a Taoiseach of the left. They want the commitment to social justice that Eamon Gilmore represents ensconced in Government Buildings. That’s why a clear majority of the people want to see Gilmore as Taoiseach and an ever-growing number will vote for his party.

And why not? Next week and the following week, people who save the state thousands of euro every year are being forced to protest over the abandonment of respite care.

The parents of people, especially children, with intellectual disabilities and with behavioural challenges are unsung heroes of Ireland. They make enormous sacrifices in raising children who, because of their disabilities, are dependent on their parents throughout their lives — and are often unable to respond to the love they get.

And the response of the state to those sacrifices has been to cut the resources available for giving those families a break. It makes no sense in economic terms because families who can no longer cope with children with a disability at home will have no choice but to place them in residential services and that will ultimately cost the state far more.

Like all carers, the parents of people with a disability provide incredible value to the state. But it makes even less sense in terms of ordinary human decency. If this is what we have come to, then I suspect the people of Ireland, in their infinite wisdom, will be looking for radical changes in policy and personnel at the first available opportunity. The people who have to march over the next couple of weeks won’t forget these cutbacks whenever they march to the ballot box.

But the people of Ireland said something else last week, at least in terms of an opinion poll. And it was equally wise because they said they were more than willing, if given a chance to change the constitution, in order to provide the best possible level of protection to children in Ireland.

As you know, the people tend to be slow to change the constitution.

Ever since 1937 the people have seen it as the most important document in the Irish legal system and as absolutely central to the administration of Government and the relationship between the state and its citizens.

We have tended to treasure the constitution because it sets out our personal rights and because it sets limits on what the state can do and how it can do it.

Although it contains strong protection for the family, the constitution has always been virtually silent on the rights of children. For several years now a number of organisations who work for the protection and welfare of children have been campaigning to have children’s rights explicitly included in the constitution, and that campaign has been gathering momentum and urgency since the publication of the Ryan report.

Last week saw the first concrete evidence that the people of Ireland strongly agree with the principle of putting certain rights for the children of Ireland in Bunreacht na hÉireann. In fact, only 1% of people disagree with that proposition.

That was the core result of a national independent opinion poll, commissioned by the children’s organisations and carried out by one of Ireland’s leading polling companies.

The organisations (the one I work for was one of them) believe passionately that we need a referendum and we need it now. Children must be protected and their rights promoted to ensure they are consistently treated with the respect and dignity they deserve. We have dozens of reports and loads of evidence highlighting the neglect, abuse and exploitation that happens when children’s voices are silenced and their best interests ignored.

But despite that, children in Ireland have played second fiddle to the agendas of individuals, institutions and policies for too long. We have always believed that if the people were given a chance, they would readily agree with the notion that children should play second fiddle no longer.

That’s why we commissioned the survey, to ask people a number of quite specific questions.

And the results are very revealing. 92% of people agree that children should have a right to such protection and care as is necessary for their safety and welfare. 89% of people agree that children’s rights should be clearly laid out in the constitution. 89% agree that the state should be able to intervene in families where children are at risk.

But 87% agree too that the state should intervene in families with great care for the rights of both children and family. And 81% agree that children’s and parent’s rights should be balanced in the constitution.

The breakdown of results show there is little difference between people’s views whatever their age or gender, or whether they are parents or not. In overall terms, there is huge support for the proposition. I can’t remember, ever, an opinion poll about a referendum subject that had such a tiny minority as 1% against it.

EVEN the polls before the referendum on articles two and three of the constitution, in the aftermath of the Good Friday Agreement, had more opposition.

The message is pretty clear. Our constitution belongs to us the people. It is intended to be the document that contains the core principles that we as a nation stand for. The conspicuous absence of distinct rights for children in the constitution is a mirror to the fact that we never prioritised children in the past — that when we thought of children, we thought of people who were seen but not heard.

What the poll says is that the people are ready to change that, and to change it forever. The Government has promised to give the people of Ireland a chance to make that change. In fact they allocated €3million in this year’s budget to enable a referendum to happen.

But we’re running out of time. The Dáil is about to rise for its long summer break and when it comes back there will be just about three months left in the year for the Government to keep its promise.

Whatever about the political poll published at the weekend, the poll on the issue of children’s rights has one more message for the Government in it. They have nothing to be afraid of. This is one electoral battle they can win. All they have to do is let the people have their say.