Early Irish referendum tallies indicate ‘No’ vote on family, care
Early tallies from a dual referendum in Ireland on redefining family and women’s roles showed a trend towards a ‘No’ vote and a defeat for the government yesterday.
The votes are the latest attempt to reflect the changing face of European Union member Ireland, and the waning influence of the once-dominant Catholic Church.
By 1200 GMT, counting showed a trend towards a ‘No’ on the two questions about care and family, with Irish Transport Minister Eamon Ryan conceding that defeat for the propositions was imminent.
“No, we didn’t,” Ryan said when asked if the government would get the result it wanted.
“We didn’t convince the public of the argument for a Yes-Yes vote,” he added.
“I think the next government will have to come back to this and consider the campaign and what were the arguments that merited a no vote in both cases.”
The two proposals – called the family amendment and the care amendment – aimed to make changes to the text of Article 41 in the Irish constitution, written in 1937.
The first asked citizens to expand the definition of family from those founded on marriage to also include “durable relationships” such as cohabiting couples and their children.
The second proposed replacing old-fashioned language around a mother’s
“duties in the home” with a clause recognising care provided by family members to one another.
The constitution, the core legal text of the nation, can only be modified through a national referendum with the support of the Irish people.
The country of 5.3 million opted to end constitutional limits on same-sex marriage in 2015 and abortion in 2018.
Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of a Polish bishop accused of covering up child sexual abuse by priests, the Vatican said yesterday, the second such decision in as many months.
Andrzej Dziuba, the 73-yearold bishop of Lowicz, central Poland, resigned “at the request of the Holy See”, said the apostolic nuncio representing the Vatican in Poland.
Polish media have reported allegations that Dziuba knew of at least two paedophile priests in his diocese.
Instead of launching an investigation, he had simply transferred them to different parishes.
The apostolic nuncio said the Vatican had identified “difficulties” in Dziuba’s management of the diocese, “in particular negligence in handling sexual abuse cases committed by some clergy against minors”.
Last month, the Holy See announced the resignation of Andrzej Dziega, a former archbishop of Szczecin, who is also embroiled in a sexual abuse cover-up scandal.