Ireland votes to liberalise divorce laws in landslide referendum

IRISH voters have overwhelmingly endorsed a plan to liberalise the country’s constitution to make it easier for couples to divorce.

More than 82 per cent of voters endorsed removing a requirement that couples be separated for four of the previous five years before they can divorce. The result was one of the largest margins of victory in a referendum since the vote backing the Good Friday Agreement in 1998.

It will fall to Ireland’s Parliament to come up with new legislation to govern divorce. The country’s Fine Gael partyled government has proposed halving the separation period to two years.

Divorce was banned in the largely Roman Catholic country until 1995.

Ireland has seen rapid social change in recent years. In 2015, the country voted to legalise same-sex marriage, and last year voters opted by a two-toone margin to end a constitutional ban on abortion.

The latest referendum is a further sign of the declining influence of the Catholic Church in the country, which had urged voters to reject the proposal. Ahead of the poll, Bishop Denis Nulty, head of the Irish Catholic Bishops Council for Marriage and Family, called for deep reflection on “the implications of this referendum, which seeks to expedite the dissolution of marriage”.

There was no further statement from the council yesterday.

But Charlie Flanagan, Ireland’s minister for equality and justice, hailed the humanity shown by the country’s voters. “This is a very decisive result with a consistent, high level of support right across the country.

“The result is testament to the compassion and fairness of Irish people in every part of the country,” he said.