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Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 5 Jun 1974

Vol. 273 No. 4

Adoption Bill, 1974: Second Stage.

I move: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

When I took office I was very conscious that there was and that there had been for some time a persistent demand for changes in the Adoption Acts. I knew that my predecessor had announced his agreement with the need for change. As time permitted, I studied the representations that had been made and that continued to be made and I consulted the Adoption Board, the adoption societies and individual social workers. I say "as time permitted" for Deputies will, I am sure, appreciate that over the last year a great number of urgent matters have made demands on my time. I am glad, however, to be able to come before the House now with the present Bill which is the result of my study and which fairly represents the consensus of the views I listened to on the subject. I do not expect that this Bill will satisfy all the critics of the present law nor do I believe that it is necessarily the last Bill that will be introduced in relation to adoption.

I think that it is well to make the point during the debate on this Bill that adoption in our law is a voluntary arrangement which is, so to speak, ratified by An Bord Uchtála, the effect of the ratification being that the legal relationship of the child to the other parties is changed. The board's function is not to settle disputes as to custody but only to ensure that the adoption is in accordance with the Acts and that the adopters are suitable.

It would almost certainly be contrary to the Constitution to purport to confer on An Board Uchtála power to resolve disputes as to custody. Moreover, any changes in the Adoption Acts that would be likely to increase the risk of disputes in regard to the making of adoption orders would be undesirable since public confidence in the system could thereby very easily be shaken. In this connection I might say that over 20,000 adoption orders have so far been made and there have been no more than three or four cases when the action of the board has been challenged. This is a good record and we must be careful to ensure that it is maintained. As I have said elsewhere, it is a distinct advantage that we have been able to establish and maintain a system whereby all adoption orders are made by a single board rather than by a multiplicity of courts or boards as in most countries. However, the strain on the members who, apart from the chairman serve on a voluntary, unpaid basis, is considerable, and we are all much beholden to them. It is not generally realised that members meet three or four times in the week or that they can be called on at short notice to travel to provincial venues. I am glad to have this opportunity of paying tribute to them for too often they have to suffer inaccurate criticism from persons on the fringe of adoption work who have not a full realisation of the complexities of the subject. The proposal in the Bill for the appointment of a deputy chairman is intended to relieve the chairman of the necessity of having to be present at all meetings. This will give him more time for administrative and research work.

The criticisms of the present law deal, largely, with the following points:—

(a) limitation on adoption arising out of the religion of the parties;

(b) withholding or withdrawing consent by the mother raising the question of a time limit on consents;

(c) the low upper limit (seven years) on the age of a child eligible to be placed for adoption;

(d) the standards applied by adoption societies;

(e) private placements;

(f) the lack of provision for adopting a child who is neither illegitimate nor an orphan.

The Bill obviously does not go as far as some people would wish in dealing with the problem of the mother who withdraws her consent to her child's adoption or who withholds her consent even when she has parted with the child, perhaps for a considerable period. I am of opinion and have so provided in the Bill that this problem, involving as it does a question of custody, should be dealt with in the High Court and not by the board. In the case, therefore, of a procrastinating or indecisive mother, the adoptive parents may seek an order for the custody of the child and, if granted to them, the board may then make an adoption order on foot of it and notwithstanding the refusal or failure of the mother to make up her mind.

It will, of course, be necessary to consider whether rules of court can be devised to enable such applications to be heard in such a way as to preserve the anonymity of the parties. This is a difficult area because it is full of emotion involving the dilemma which must face every mother who considers adoption for her child. This provision seeks to resolve this dilemma in favour of the child and I am satisfied this is the correct approach in spite of the apparent harsh overriding of the mother's instinctive doubts. Family courts would be the ideal tribunal for such applications, but until we have such an institution, the High Court appears to be the most appropriate forum. I think it would be unsafe to go further than this, for example, by laying down absolute time limits, not least because to do so could, in some cases, have the effect of frightening off the mother from allowing her child to be placed with a family at all.

The Bill provides that a consent to adoption may be given at any time after the child has reached the age of six weeks instead of the age of six months as is the case now. There may be some misgivings about this since in some cases the mother's capacity to give a fully rational decision so soon after the birth might be in doubt, but the prevailing view in adoption circles favours this change. Indeed, it is contended that in most cases the mother in the months prior to the birth will have been giving thoughts to the idea of adoption. Again, looking at the problem from the point of view of the child, and I submit this is the right perspective, it is common case that the earlier a child can be placed, the better. In any event the mother will still have the right to withdraw her consent at any time before the making of the adoption order.

Perhaps the most widespread criticism of the present law was focused on the provision that, with relatively minor exceptions, required all parties to an adoption to be of the same religion. As I had told a conference of adoption workers in Limerick some weeks ago I had prepared a provision that would have met this criticism and, which, incidentally, would have covered the case that was before the High Court recently. This Bill was actually first ordered for the day on which the High Court judgment was pronounced, but it had to be withdrawn to enable the relevant provision to be redrafted in the light of the judgment.

The High Court decision has, in effect, swept away the provision in the Act completely. The Bill proposes formally to repeal the provision but it introduces the safeguard that a person whose consent is required to the making of an adoption order must know the religion of the adopter or adopters at the time his consent is given in cases where the parties are not all of the same religion. Section 3 as drafted might appear to go further than this and I will be proposing an amendment on Committee Stage to make it clear that it is only in cases where the adoptive parents and the child and its mother are not all of the same religion that the mother will be informed of the religion of each of the adoptive parents at the time she gives her consent.

This requirement might appear to some as having the effect of inhibiting placements with couples of differing religions by drawing the difference to the attention of the mother. It could also be objected to as allowing the mother something she has never had, an exclusion basic to adoption principles, that is an influence, though slight, in the choice of adoptive parents. The contrary view is that if this requirement were not present a mother would never know whether her child was in a mixed marriage or not and this could have two effects. It could inhibit mothers from placing children at all where they might have conscientious objection to placement in a mixed marriage or where a mother did consent it could lead to problems of scruples in later years for the mother. I will be glad to have the views and assistance of Deputies on this point.

Experience in the 21 years since the original Act came into force has thrown up cases, such as the case that resulted in the recent High Court judgment, where it was clearly anomalous and unfair that there could not be an adoption. These cases have been rare and unusual, however. The criticism levelled at the Acts in this connection has usually related to the fact that a married couple of different religions could not adopt. But this, in itself, did not represent a problem in so far as the welfare of the children was concerned, since there are always far more would-be adopters than children available for adoption. It could be then, that some modification of the present law in this regard might have served to eliminate the anomalous situations and be in conformity with the Constitution. The Government, however, have decided to accept the situation as it now is following the High Court judgment.

It has been contended on many occasions that abandoned or neglected children whose parents are living should be capable of being adopted. It is difficult to answer the criticism that an abandoned or neglected child is better in a new home than in an institution neglected by its natural parents. I sympathise completely with the humanity of that plea. I am advised, however, that the inalienable and imprescriptible rights guaranteed to the family by the Constitution make it impossible to extend the benefits of adoption to legitimate children whose parents are still living. While these children cannot be legally adopted it is true that people do take them into their homes and rear them as their own in the knowledge that the natural parents may sooner or later come to claim them. Of course, under our law, they can only successfully claim them if it is for the child's welfare that it be returned to its natural parents. If the contrary should be the case, the foster parents may seek to retain the custody of the child under the Guardianship of Infants Act which prescribes that the child's welfare shall be paramount. This would not have all the legal consequences of adoption but nevertheless would secure the wellbeing of the neglected or abandoned child. The Constitution in conferring inalienable rights and duties on the natural parents in a family has drawn a line in respect of permanent severance of those rights to the extent that it does not permit the extinguishment of those rights and duties in any formal way such as by an adoption order. This is an important principle and one whose validity is not necessarily impugned by the occurrence of some cases where parents quite clearly cannot or do not wish to exercise those duties.

One of the most frequent criticisms of the Adoption Acts in recent times is that they have no provision enabling the board to make "regulations" providing for "standards" to be followed by adoption societies. This criticism discounts the fact that the board's powers in relation to societies are very wide in as much as, under section 37 of the 1952 Act, the board may cancel the registration of any society if satisfied that it is not competent to discharge the obligations imposed on it under the Act or if it appears to the board that the requirements of the Act are not being adequately complied with by it or if anybody engaged in its management or control, or engaged in adoption work on its behalf, is not a fit and proper person so to act. In this connection it is essential to distinguish between procedure and standards. Guidelines have been laid down by the Adoption Board as regards pre-placement examination, post-placement inspection, medical examination and so on. What legislation cannot do is to ensure standards. The law cannot prescribe the level of efficiency at which any individual operates anymore than it can prescribe the adequacy of parents in looking after their children. I have discussed this matter with the Adoption Board and they have told me firmly that they do not need or want the power to make regulations binding on adoption societies. I must accept that advice.

It is well recognised that placements by private persons are in principle unsatisfactory and ought to be discouraged. Adoption societies exercise great care in selecting adopters. They keep in touch with the board and they develop an expertise. Even the best motivated and most careful layman is unlikely to be as competent as a society. In any case private placements are usually made in the interests of the mother or of the adopters and only secondarily in the interests of the child. I consider that private placements should be made by the parent of the child, who would usually be the mother, or unless the placement is with a relative of the child.

As I have already mentioned, section 2 of the Bill proposes that the consent of the child's mother or guardian or any person having charge or control over the child to the making of an adoption order shall not be necessary where custody of the child has been awarded to any person by the High Court, though it is not proposed to repeal the provision that where a person is a ward of court the consent shall not be dispensed with save with the sanction of the court.

Section 3 of the Bill provides that an adoption order shall not be made unless every person whose consent is necessary to the making of the order knows the religion, if any, of the applicant or of each of the applicants when he gives his consent.

Section 4 provides that, in addition to existing restrictions on the making of arrangements for adoption contained in section 34 of the 1952 Act, private placements made otherwise than direct by the child's parent or parents will be unlawful unless the placement is with a relative of the child.

Section 5 provides for the appointment of a deputy chairman to the board who may act for the chairman in the latter's absence. At present whenever the chairman is unable to act it is necessary for the Government to formally appoint an acting chairman.

Section 15 of the Adoption Act, 1952, provides that a consent shall not be valid unless it is given after the child has attained the age of six months and not earlier than three months before the application for the adoption order. Section 6 of the Bill provides for the reduction of this period to six weeks. This does not affect the right of the mother to withdraw her consent at any time before the making of the adoption order. Section 15 of the 1952 Act further provides that if the mother of an illegitimate child changes her religion either during the 12 months before the birth or within 12 months afterwards, her consent to the adoption of the child may not be given for 12 months after the change of religion or 12 months after the child's birth whichever is the later. It is not proposed that this provision be re-enacted.

Section 7 proposes to empower the board to prescribe that a child must be in the care of the applicants for an adoption order for a specified period before an adoption order can be made. It also provides that the board may, having regard to the particular circumstances of the case, make an adoption order in respect of a child notwithstanding that the child has not been in the care of the applicants for the period prescribed. It has been the board's practice to insist that a child be in the care of the adopters for a probationary period before an adoption order is made. It is recognised that, generally speaking, a period of at least six months is needed for all concerned to assess whether the adoption is likely to be a success. The proposal is to give the board power to prescribe a probationary period.

Section 8 provides that the entry in the Adopted Children Register shall be in the form provided for in section 22 of the 1952 Act and set out in the Second Schedule to that Act or in such other form as may be approved from time to time by the Minister for Justice with the consent of the Minister for Health and shall contain the particulars required by such form. This technical provision has been included at the request of the Minister for Health.

Section 9 provides that where the board is satisfied that in the particular circumstances of the case it is desirable to do so, it may make an adoption order in respect of a child who was more than seven years of age at the date of the application for the order. It is recognised that the younger a child is when placed for adoption the better the prospects are for integration in the adoptive family. Nevertheless, situations could possibly arise where it would be desirable to make an adoption order when a child is more than seven years of age. The board have asked for this power.

Section 10 provides for the payment of remuneration to the deputy chairman when he is acting as chairman.

Section 11 and the Schedule to the Bill provide for the repeal of certain provisions in the Principal Act and in the 1964 Act. Section 12 of the Principal Act and section 6 of the 1964 Act are the sections relating to religion.

Section 16 of the Principal Act sets out the persons entitled to be heard by the board before the board decide on an application for an adoption order. One of the persons listed is a priest or minister of a religion "recognised by the Constitution". This phrase has been rendered meaningless by the referendum which removed subsections 2 and 3 of Article 44 from the Constitution. I consider, however, that the phrase should be formally deleted from the Act. The other repeals are consequential.

I should like to say that my study of adoption laws convinced me of the vital necessity for adoption societies to maintain high standards and to employ expert personnel. Societies are responsible for 80 per cent of all placements and their work is highly specialised and delicate. I should like to pay a tribute to the societies, big and small, who have done great work down the years without any State subvention. Some of them have highly professional personnel and have always maintained standards beyond any that could properly be insisted on by the board or by any other public agency, indeed to the extent of causing disappointment to many would-be adopters by the care they take to select for the children entrusted to them the most suitable homes from among the many available. Early in my term of office I realised that the societies were in need of such a subvention and I very easily persuaded my colleague, the Minister for Finance, to provide me with the resources to make an annual grant to any society that made a case for it. My basic aim is to enable the societies to employ professional social workers on a more extensive scale than they have hitherto been in a position to do.

Finally, let me return again to a point I mentioned earlier, namely, research in the field of adoption. Regrettably there has been little or no research in the field in this country despite the advantages for the purpose afforded by our centralised system. Now that our system has attained its majority it is appropriate that research should be undertaken to establish its particular strengths or weaknesses as well, of course, as the strengths and weaknesses of adoption in general. It is my intention to encourage such research and I shall be prepared to seek any necessary financial backing for suitable projects.

I commend the Bill to the House and I look forward to a constructive debate on a highly important and sensitive subject which is, I believe, entirely non-political. I shall consider carefully all ideas and suggestions that Deputies put forward.

The Minister has called, and rightly so, for a constructive debate on this worthwhile but extremely sensitive subject. I trust that from this side of the House the Minister will hear constructive arguments and suggestions which we shall be putting forward for his consideration.

We accept the Bill in principle. Its purpose is to eliminate what can be described as anomalies in the field of adoption. The Minister has paid tribute to the Adoption Board and to the various adoption agencies and societies that have been engaged in this work since the enacting of the 1952 legislation. We in this party join with the Minister in that tribute. So far as I am aware the chairman of the Adoption Board is the only person on the board who receives remuneration. The six ordinary members work on a voluntary basis. All of them deserve the utmost credit.

As the Minister has said, the agencies have done very good work within the structures that we have laid down for them. Therefore, any criticism we would make might be regarded as a reflection on ourselves as legislators. In a way it might be described as inverted criticism.

The 1952 Adoption Act was the founding Act in this country. In England and Wales adoption was introduced in 1926 and in Northern Ireland in 1929. It was introduced in Scotland in 1930.

Since the introduction of the 1952 Act there have been many placements of children. A figure of 20,000 has been mentioned here in this regard and we are being asked now, 22 years after the enacting of the founding legislation, to have another look at this subject. All Deputies in the House should endeavour to make some contribution to this debate. We are legislating here for children, for those who cannot legislate for themselves and who must "suffer" any legislation that we may enact here on their behalf. That is why I agree with the Minister when he says that this legislation is of a very sensitive nature.

Apparently there are some 18 or 20 adoption societies in existence. The Minister has indicated his willingness to accept the possibility of research into the whole subject. No doubt he is aware that there is being conducted a survey of this nature by the social studies department of TCD. My information is that the findings will be published within the next month or so. It was my pleasure and honour to speak to some of the people employed in the survey in that particular college, a constituent college of the National University of Ireland. The assistance I received from these people in an area of which I did not have very much knowledge before the Minister presented the Bill to the House has been invaluable. I would like to thank them for the time they gave me in formulating what can be described as a contribution to this House.

The Minister received a copy of the treatise or pamphlet prepared in Trinity College, Dublin. If possible, I am sure he will give them financial assistance. There may be a regulation which prevents him from doing so. However, this is now on the record of the House and I look forward to the publication of the document on adoption in Ireland.

People have various reasons for adopting. The 1964 Act introduced a number of amendments to fill the gaps in the Principal Act of 1952. It has been suggested that the 1952 Act was too mother-centred. We should be thinking of Adoption Acts in terms of children. These Acts should become more child-centred. We agree with that. I do not apologise to the House for using these clichés to express what I am trying to get across. We believe that the whole area of adoption should be centred around the child. It is important that the position of adopting parents should be taken into consideration. We are dealing with children, newly born, who cannot look after themselves. We are dealing with human beings and placing them in adoptive families. From that moment the child becomes a third element in a childless home. Therefore, we must consider any legislation relating to adoption which is introduced here in the context of the child. "Child centred" is a good expression. Although it is a cliché I use it without apology.

At the beginning of a debate of this kind, it is helpful to set out the motivating factors why couples wish to adopt a child. They may be unable to have children of their own. They may want companionship for a single child. They may want a child to take the place of a baby who has died. If they have children of their own, they may feel that their home is good enough to bring in another child. The child may be related to the adoptive parents. It is not unknown for parents to adopt a first, second and third child. Parents who adopt children are good people. Arising out of the motivating factors I have outlined, the people are fulfilling a need. They are providing a service to the community by adopting a child who, through no fault of its own, its natural mother wishes to have adopted. Then we have a couple who are willing to take on the future of this child. This is a very big responsibility. These are some of the motivating factors in adopting children.

As the Minister said, this is an extremely sensitive area. Motivating factors can be of a very sensitive and, in some instances, delicate nature. This Bill gives us an opportunity to re-examine the whole area of adoption. Anything we on this side of the House say will be said in a constructive manner. It will not be done by way of carping criticism of adoption societies or of the Adoption Board. Quite the contrary.

Having discussed the whole area of adoption with members of adoption societies—I did not have an opportunity, unfortunately, of speaking to a member of the Adoption Board— adoptive parents and a natural mother of an adopted child, one gets a feeling for the subject and an awareness of the lacks which exist within the existing framework. One matter which kept recurring, particularly in relation to the home or the couple who take on the child, was the assessment of the adopting couple before the child is given by qualified professional workers. The word "assessment" came through all my discussions with these people, assessment of the couple before the child is placed. Assessment of the couple by a qualified trained person.

Only a qualified person can do this very important job. The Minister has properly said that he will give financial assistance to adoption societies who employ these qualified people. This is a very specialised field. The only people who can deal with the placement of children are these specialists in the field of adoption, specialists in that one field and that one field only. That is how important we on this side of the House consider the area of adoption. That is why we are laying such emphasis on the type of person to assess the couple.

This can be an extremely anxious time for the couple who intend to adopt. If one sends in, through no fault of his own, a poorly-educated social worker in the field of adoption, there are sensitivities which can be hurt. There are things which can be said, or left unsaid, which can hurt the adopting parents. That is why we stress the need for highly qualified personnel in the field of adoption.

The qualified professional worker would go into the home of the intending adopting couple on a number of occasions before the actual placement. When the child is given over for a six-month period before the matter comes to the attention of the board the professional worker should again go to work to see how the child is getting on and how the adopting parents are reacting to the child. The parents should be seen together and separately in their home by the professional worker. Reaction to the child should be examined. This is very important. During the phase in which the proposed adopting parents are being assessed by the professional worker and before they actually take on the child—and in this I am not sure whether I am using the correct expression and one must be careful of the terminology used—and in the probationary period, which is a waiting period of six months, there is always the possibility that the natural parent could rescind on her decision to have the child adopted. This is a very difficult period for the intending parents. I may be corrected on that particular point. If that happens I will stand corrected.

After the board make the adoption order absolute, there should be a follow-up period in which a highly qualified professional worker visits the home over a period of years to see the child and the adoptive parents. There should be total standardisation of procedures in this respect.

Having dealt with the care of the child, which is of paramount importance and should be given the highest priority in the whole scheme, we now come to the position of the natural mother. The natural mother gives birth to the illegitimate child. She is entitled to as much professional advice and assistance as she can get. The medical personnel and other professional people with whom she deals in the course of her pregnancy will be found to be extremely kind and generous in their attention to the unfortunate girl. That may be the wrong expression, but the girl finds herself in the dilemma of becoming an unmarried mother. These people are kind in every respect but kindness is one thing and highly specialised advice is another. We believe that during the course of her pregnancy this unfortunate girl is entitled to the best possible advice, through State agencies. Basically, when a woman finds herself pregnant and becoming an unmarried mother she is in a state of emotional washout. It is difficult for a male to understand the feelings of a woman who finds herself in that position. She is probably in a very emotional state at such a dreadful time. These professional services should be at her disposal and their availability known to her.

There is probably much more to be said about the child and the mother in such circumstances. My intention is to express further views on the matter of professional services and the type of assistance that should be given at a later stage in the discussion on this Bill. There are Catholic adoption agencies and Protestant adoption agencies. It is now the Minister's intention that third party agencies should be dispensed with except in the instance outlined in the proposed new section 4 of the Bill before us. We accept what the Minister has said here. Private adoptions do not have the benefit of scrutiny. In the main they do not have the benefit of the experience of people who know something about adoption. That is why we agree with the Minister that third party adoptions should be dispensed with and become illegal.

The Minister provides sanctions for contravening the laws that will come into existence. We agree with this matter. In June, 1972, the then Minister for Justice, Deputy O'Malley, said in the Seanad that he intended to deal with this whole area of adoption and that he would get down basically to the type of Bill which the Minister has before the House at the moment. It is not for that reason we welcome the Bill. We welcome the Bill on its merits. We welcome it because it is a good Bill in law.

I would like to deal with a number of other problems which may prove difficult in practice while they may appear satisfactory on paper. When it comes to the practice of the law in this regard we may find ourselves in difficulty. We will deal with that later on. The Minister said that he would assist agencies wishing to employ the highly qualified staff that are envisaged. In 1972 there were 12 full-time and 21 part-time unqualified workers employed in 16 societies. The total number of staff employed by the 16 societies was as follows: professional trained social workers—full-time four, part-time seven; basic grade workers—full-time 10, part-time 13; untrained workers—full-time 12, part-time 21. Of the personnel employed in adoption work 50 per cent have no training in social work, although some of these have other training which could possibly be relevant. The real need for highly trained professional people exists. There is a sense of urgency about it. This is not in any way to under-rate the work being done by adopting societies as they exist at the moment. I do not wish to be critical of these people. In the main they have worked well in this field since 1952.

A person like myself is not competent to discuss the whole area of adoption with any great authority but, like other Deputies, I can bring my own particular experience and knowledge to bear. We cannot be expected to know everything about the people who actually work on the ground, as it were, in the field of adoption but, having listened to the views and opinions of those involved at all levels in this work, we are entitled to form our own opinions and views and throw them out here for purposes of discussion. We will hope to do that as constructively as possible. We have no intention of engaging in carping criticism.

I have paid tribute and now I think I am entitled to produce my own views and to give some facts and figures in support of those views. Deputies will have received a memorandum from CARE. I should like to pay tribute here to the work being done by this organisation and to the research they have carried out in the whole field of adoption. Chapter 9, under the heading of "Substitute Families" deals with adoption. In the year 1956 there were 565 adoptions. In 1964 there were 1,003 adoptions. In 1967 there were 1,493 adoptions. Up to recently there was a feeling on the part of some people that there was a sort of stigma attaching to adoption. I believe we are now beginning to throw off this feeling. There is also a stupid myth that one can bring bad blood into a family through adoption. One can do no such thing. All this is utter nonsense. All one does in adoption is to take a child and rear it in a decent environment so that the child will develop on normal lines. If we do nothing more here than get rid forever of the kind of mentality to which I referred a moment ago, we will be doing a darned good day's work from the point of view of adoption.

Table 9 (2) in this memorandum analyses adoptions and it is an important analysis. In 1968 the number of Catholic children adopted was 1,303; other denominations, 40. This gives a total of 1,343. The number of children adopted by relatives was 118. The number adopted by non-relatives was 1,225. The number adopted through societies or local authorities was 1,055. The number adopted by mother of third party 288. The number of second children adopted was 442. The number boarded out by health authorities was 23. I imagine that relates to fosterage.

It is interesting to note that CARE proposes that one-third of the members of the board should be qualified in child welfare and an adequate number of qualified workers should be employed by the board to supervise or "inspect" adoption. These are regarded as the minimum standards to be laid down for all adoption societies.

The board at present is constituted of a chairman and six ordinary members. They are worthy people in every respect who have been willing to perform a voluntary service for the benefit of the community. We talk about the need for professionals specialising in adoption at agency level. Why cannot we also have specialists sitting on the board listening to other specialists presenting cases on behalf of married couples proposing to adopt? It is not unreasonable that the board should have qualified specialists on it. It cannot be overstressed here that those who are really knowledgeable on this subject do not want specialists with a disparate knowledge of three, four or five different fields. They want specialists knowledgeable in one field, the field of adoption. It would be well worthwhile examining the proposition that one-third of the board, two people, should be specialists.

I am surprised the Minister did not deal with the specific functions of the Department of Justice in this field. Perhaps when he is replying he will deal with these functions. I understand there are welfare visitors who visit the homes of the adoptive parents. What are the qualifications of these people? My information is that they are very good people in every respect but they are not qualified for the kind of work about which we are speaking here. I understand they are appointed by the Civil Service Commission. The commission, I believe, when dealing with appointments have sitting with them people qualified in the particular matters in which they are interested. That is as it should be. As I understand it, all the welfare visitors require is a good general education, training in and experience of social work. If I am wrong in that, I presume the Minister will correct me when he comes to reply to this debate. That, I think, is not a proper position. The Minister should set the headline in this respect. He should go into the universities, technical colleges, or wherever and get these qualified people.

There is another interesting matter to which I should like to refer and which arises from a book I read recently. The book was entitled In Search of Origins—the experiences of adopted people, the people about whom we are speaking at the moment. It was written by a citizen named John Triselotis——

From Cork?

I do not think so. He is a Celt. Whether or not he is from Cork I do not know. In this book he deals with the whole area of the experiences of adopted people, as the title suggests. It raises the matter of confidentiality and if the child should know who his natural parents are or were. Scotland allows it, and as I understand it, Finland also. England will be permitting it in the not too distant future. In other words, the question is whether or not the option of finding out who are the natural parents should be given to the adopted child. At the moment—not having done research into it to any great degree—I would prefer the Irish system, that the confidentiality of the natural parent or parents be upheld. I have not decided in my own mind whether or not the Scottish system is the proper one.

However, we are discussing the child and his rights. In Ireland, under existing legislation, the adopting parents will never get to know who the natural parents are. But the question remains as to whether or not the child himself should have the right to know who his natural parents are. It may be undesirable. It may be wrong. It is not for me to decide. Nevertheless, it is a matter that might be considered in the light of the experience in other countries. One can imagine the trauma that can be caused when a child is told he is adopted and is not the child of the adoptive parents. One has to pick a time in the development of the child when he can withstand that. But, having been told, the child might not be that sensitive of the fact. The child might not be hyper-tensed or whatever and be able to take the fact that mummy and daddy are not really mummy and daddy, if you know what I mean. Having read a number of pieces of literature on the matter, the child having been told he is not the natural child of his adoptive father and mother seems to begin to build up fantasies. In some instances he may imagine that his natural mother and father were princesses, kings or whatever. Whether, in those circumstances, the child should be told—as obtains in Scotland—is a question that remains to be solved. In Scotland a child, if he wants, can be told who are his natural parents to break down this fantasy. It is suggested that they should be told around the age of 18 years that they have this option. The option should be left to the child if he is developed enough to understand what is being said to him or the option being offered him. However, I do not think it is the function of politicians to hand out moral judgments and, if we were to be critical of the Scottish system, this would be a form of handing out moral judgment. That type of judgment should be left to others who consider themselves competent so to do. I often wonder who those people are but I do not think it is a politician's function to exercise moral judgment on that or any other matter.

To come back to the Bill itself, we believe it is untidy. We were glad to hear that the Minister intends amending, I think it was, section 3 dealing with religion. He would need to take a careful look at the section and we shall be anxious to see what type of amendment he will put forward. There exists now the case which Mr. Justice Pringle ruled on, as reported in The Irish Times of Tuesday, 14th May, 1974. The heading reads: “Section of Adoption Act Ruled Unconstitutional: Couple Win High Court Action”. The introduction to the story says:

A young Dublin couple succeeded in their High Court action yesterday in having declared unconstitutional the section of the Adoption Act, 1952, which prohibited them from adopting the wife's illegitimate son. In a reserved judgment Mr. Justice Pringle made an order declaring section 12 (2) of the Act to be repugnant to the Constitution.

In fact, the schedule to the 1974 Bill repeals section 12 of the 1952 Act. In section 3 there is a side note stating that it is religion. We agree, in principle, with the fact that the natural parent should be told the religion of the applicant parent. In a Catholic country like Ireland, I personally agree that couples of different religions living together should be entitled, as of right, as citizens of this country, to adopt children. Of course, that High Court action dispensed with the unreality of their non-entitlement to adopt. I think it important that the religious factor has now been take out of the area of adoption. So much for the law. One can only speculate and the difficulty, as I see it, is that in a country which is 95 per cent Catholic one will find that the natural mother will be a Catholic and she will not wish to place her child with parents of mixed religion. As I see it, that is the unfortunate nature of the section. But I can understand the Minister's difficulty. He had to bring in the section. He intended bringing it in anyway whether or not the court ruled otherwise. He intended bringing in the section doing away with the religious requirement, except in relation to the choice by the natural parent on being told the religion of the adopting couple. It would then be a decision for the natural mother as to whether or not she found it desirable that the child be brought up in the religion of the adopting parents. The Minister was in serious difficulty and he had to produce a formula. He informs us now that he intends amending his own section. We agree basically with what he intends amending.

But then he makes a point in the course of his introductory speech, on page 3, which reads as follows:

It will, of course, be necessary to consider whether rules of court can be devised to enable such applications to be heard in such a way as to preserve the anonymity of the parties.

We shall have to preserve the anonymity of the parties if this Bill is to work. It is a difficult area, as the Minister says, and full of the emotion involved in the dilemma which faces people.

The Minister made clear the reason for section 2. He was far clearer in this regard than the section itself. The reason is valid, that the mother may be procrastinating or indecisive, and the adoptive parents may then seek an order of the court for the custody of the child. If this is granted the Adoption Board may then make an order on foot of the court's decision notwithstanding the refusal or failure of the mother to make up her mind. It is a harrowing experience for the mother having gone through the whole gamut of becoming a mother and then having to decide whether she will have the child adopted. One can only have the greatest sympathy with a woman in that situation. But the Minister must deal with it because, in addition to the mother of the child he must take the child itself into consideration and also the adoptive parents who are also human and sensitive and may be unable to have a child themselves.

It is an extraordinary thing that, in many instances when parents adopt a child, within a short time afterwards they are able to have their own child. That is a well-known phenomenon, or whatever the medical expression is; it is a reality.

We can see the Minister's difficulty on section 2 and we concede that if the unhappy woman is unable to make up her mind some action must be taken to preserve the rights and entitlement of the child.

We agree with section 3 but if the Minister would tidy it up it would be a great help to the House. We shall see what he has to say in this respect; he might produce the amendment as soon as possible after the Second Stage debate.

In section 4 he deletes the restriction, recognised by the Constitution, from the Principal Act which is hereby amended by the substitution for section 34 of another section that must go by definition. The referendum dispensed with the need to mention any particular religion in the Constitution and that is proper.

We also agree with the Minister on section 6 which amends the Principal Act by the substitution for section 15 of the following section:

"15. (1) A consent shall not be valid unless it is given after the child has attained the age of six weeks and not earlier than three months before the application for adoption.

Could the Minister explain the second part of this section? That may need some clarification. Having put it to a number of people I found they did not quite understand it and I could not help them to any great extent except by supposing that it could mean this or that. This is not good enough. We want to know exactly what it means. The Minister might clarify that point and if it does need redrafting, let it be redrafted. We do agree that the consent should not be valid unless it is given after the child has attained the age of six weeks. It is generally here that the mother has the first post-natal checkup and it is probably the right time. There is a school of thought that the sooner after birth the child is adopted the better from the child's point of view but under the circumstances I think it is proper to have some restrictions on the time.

We in Opposition have received many representations from various organisations including CARE. I received a copy of a letter which was sent to the Minister by the Galway branch of CARE. The Minister, although not paying tribute to CARE has acknowledged that he did receive representations. This is a copy of a letter which is not confidential. I am not throwing it in the Minister's face —quite the contrary. It says:

We understand that some amendments to the Adoption Acts 1952 and 1964 are to be introduced in the near future. We urge very strongly that the following be included in these amendments:

(1) Private or third party placements to be forbidden.

(2) adequate pre-placement service to be provided.

(3) provision for minimum standard of staffing and training before an adoption society is accepted for registration.

(4) only registered adoption societies to be allowed to place children for adoption.

(5) standard mode of operation for all adoption societies, and

(6) abolition of mixed marriage clause.

The mixed marriage clause has been abolished in law and we must see how it works in practice. Some of us may have doubts about its operability. May I conclude by thanking those who assisted me in formulating my views, the adoption agency and others who assisted the party by propounding views which, having heard them and discussed them, we decided were worth projecting in the course of this debate.

I should like to speak briefly, first, to congratulate my colleague, the Minister for Justice, on this fine, comprehensive, humane and somewhat overdue piece of legislation which I think will mean a good deal to those who are concerned with adopted children, including adoptive parents and the children themselves. My party have long advocated a number of measures which now see the light in this legislation; the changes affecting the religion of adoptors, the stipulations about withdrawing consent by the natural mother, the age limit and other matters. I have listened with close attention to the constructive speech by Deputy Andrews on behalf of the Opposition and I am glad to find that there is a consensus in this House on this subject which will enable progress to be made.

I should like to support the tributes which have been paid to the Adoption Board. Like a number of other Deputies, I have adopted children and I know from experience the expertise, the thoroughness, tact and consideration which the board show for the adoptive parents, as well as for the welfare of the children. They do splendid work; the hours they voluntarily work and the quality of their work are remarkable and perhaps they are not sufficiently appreciated. Therefore, I am glad they have been referred to here in proper terms.

I should like also to refer to a class of people who have not been referred to hitherto, namely, those people who have care of orphans, of foundlings or abandoned children who are waiting for adoption. Some of them are adopted while fewer are not adopted. As one who has been critical of certain aspects of Church influence in this country—and probably I will be critical again—I should like to pay tribute from personal experience to orders of nuns who are active in this area. I have had personal experience of St. Patrick's, Navan Road, and the nuns in charge of the children there. Often in difficult circumstances, I have seen not only by their words but by their actions that they put the welfare of the children under their care first and before any other consideration. It is right to record that and to pay tribute to them. Theirs is a difficult and a heartrending task; it is their duty for the welfare of the children to put them through their hands as quickly as possible, however attached they may become to them. These are very difficult matters.

I welcome the fact that there has been a movement of opinion here. The point I am about to make may appear a party political point although I do not intend it as such. I realise that if there has been an evolution of opinion it has been an evolution on both sides of the House; there has also been an evolution of opinion among many clergy, which factor affects this whole matter. I raised this matter by way of questions in this House on different occasions in 1970 and 1971 and I was given to understand rather clearly that there could be no change. Two Ministers, both of whom have now left the House and I have no occasion to refer to them by name, gave me that answer; one told me. "There is a stone wall here". Everyone knew what he meant but unfortunately no one wanted to be more explicit about it.

I should like to be a little more explicit on this matter, not for the sake of any kind of recrimination but to try to eliminate a certain dimension of excessive reticence, what might be called mealy-mouthedness in this area. Deputy Andrews referred to the earlier legislation as mother-centred but I think that was a euphemism. The earlier legislation was very strongly affected by the opinions and reservations of certain senior clergy at that time which were conservative opinions.

What was wrong here and what we are getting away from is not so much the idea that the clergy of the denomination to which the majority belong should or should not influence these matters but rather our way of heeding that factor while making no reference to it. The dialect of: "There is a stone wall here" was bad. I do not think it in any way surprising that in a country where 95 per cent are Catholic—I am talking about the Twenty-Six Counties — the Catholic Church should exercise a good deal of influence. It would be very surprising if it did not. What was wrong, and what we should try to eliminate, was the failure to consider the nexus, to act as if that was not so when everyone knew it was, the "a nod is as good as a wink to a blind horse" style which this House adopted during the years as it dealt with that matter. That, more than any other aspect of our behaviour— which has not been all that bad—has tended to be divisive, to arouse suspicion among people in the North, even those who would not be suspicious of us in whatever we did. Therefore, I welcome the fact that we can make progress in this area, particularly in abolishing the iniquitous rule which prevailed about the religious qualification in relation to prospective adoptive parents, and that we can now refer in a relatively mature and adult way to the sociological considerations which surround us, including the factors I have mentioned.

Deputy Andrews referred, I think in an unguarded phrase—I nearly fell into some unguarded phraseology myself so I am not trying to attack him; and I quote because I took down his words at the time—to a Catholic country like this. It is a sort of melodeon. We are never quite sure what we are talking about in this area. If by "a country" he means what we usually mean when we are watching our words, and our Ps and Qs, which we are not always doing, the whole of Ireland, this island, to describe it as a Catholic country is inaccurate and also is not helpful.

It is a wording that any of us might fall into, but we have to watch what we are doing. If we use that phraseology in this kind of context, and if we also say we cannot abandon our inalienable right to unity, what we mean is, and we are heard to be saying is, that we cannot abandon the right to unity of a Catholic country like this. This is among the sets of attitudes—it is only one of them— which have built up the menacing situation we are now in. I am not, please, to be taken as reflecting on the language of one Deputy. It is a language into which all of us are inclined to fall from time to time. We must watch what we are doing and not combine these two claims of a Catholic country and an alienable right to unity. I should like to take up a couple of other matters in Deputy Andrews's speech.

The Minister would be lost without Deputy Andrews' speech.

It was a long speech and I am replying to it. The Deputy would not like me to pass over it in total silence. That would be impolite. It was a sincere, wellresearched and in part a moving speech. The Deputy would not want me to pay too much tribute to him so I will stop my tributes and resume my criticisms.

I thank the Minister for his tributes.

That is very nice. The Deputy referred to specialists in this area. I am sure specialists have a role but, from the little experience I have—it is not much and I should not generalise from it— the impression I have is that what is wanted in this area is not so much the expertise of sociologists and highly qualified whiz-kids of one kind or another, but common sense, experience and a love of children. If people dealing with adoption have those three qualities that is all we really need.

I had a little experience of this in America. There I saw too much of the kind of highly socially trained expertise and not enough of the other qualities I mentioned. I saw more in this country of the other qualities I mentioned and I thought a great deal more of them than I thought of what I saw there. I may have been unlucky there; I may have been lucky here. I do not want to make a black and white comparison.

In conclusion I should like again to refer to a couple of phrases which were used at the end of Deputy Andrews's speech and which I should like to take up with him by way of appeal. He talked about when the child discovers that he is not the child of the adoptive parents and that the adoptive parents are not really mammy and daddy. He is right to refer to these concepts if he is referring to concepts which prevail rather widely about adopted children and their adoptive parents but, with respect, the language is wrong in itself. If it is a good adoption, the adopted child is the child of the adoptive parents both in law and in love. He is fully their child even though they are not his natural parents. They are really his mammy and daddy.

That must be seen and upheld as I believe it is felt by both parties. When this language is used you tend to develop uncertainties in those concerned regarding the actual situation. About half the number of adoptors, I should say at a guess, know what it is both to have natural children and adopted children and know also that there is no difference at all in the actual bond of love between the parents and the children of either type. The idea that he is not really their child and that he should go in quest of his natural parents is misleading. I should not like to end on that note because the contribution from the benches opposite was very thorough and sympathetic. I think we have a consensus in this House on this matter and again I congratulate the Minister on the Bill.

I have a particular interest in this Bill because I dealt with aspects, at least, of the problem of adoption in the Department of Justice for some years. I decided while I was there that, if time permitted which, in the event, it did not, I would introduce legislation on certain lines. I am glad to say that this Bill includes many of the lines I proposed to include. It includes some others also, none of which I am in particular disagreement with. I want to say something generally about the Bill. There is nothing in it which is very revolutionary or very new——

Except that it is a Bill at all.

——in general application. The fact that no great new general principles are included and why nothing revolutionary has to be introduced now is to the credit of the system which has existed here for 22 years with one series of amendments in 1964.

I do not think we appreciate the difference between the adoption system we have and the adoption system which pertains in England and the North. As Deputy Andrews pointed out, we have the great advantage of having one central body which deals with this problem for the Twenty-six Counties. In England, adoption is a much more haphazard affair. Each county court judge in each county has jurisdiction so far as the making of adoption orders is concerned. I do not know how many county court judges there are in England but I am sure there are upwards of 100. One result of that is that you get 100 different types of emphasis laid on the approach to adoption and, in practical terms, it may be rather different in one county from what it is in another.

We have the great advantage of having a central system and one board only. The Minister quoted the figure in his opening speech. That surely is the greatest proof of all of the fact that our system has been and is basically very satisfactory. He said 20,000 adoption orders have been made since 1952 and only either three or four of those were questioned. How many of the three or four that were questioned were questioned successfully I do not know. I can only think of one offhand and that is the very recent one. Of course, there was not an order made on that occasion. That was a case of the board refusing to make an order as it had to refuse with the law as it stood. In fact, only three or four out of 20,000 were questioned and that is surely proof of the efficacy, the equity and the fairness of the adoption system as laid down in law and of the way it has been administered by the Adoption Board.

In recent years there has been a good deal of agitation on the part of a very small group in the community who allege they were discriminated against. They are the partners in a mixed marriage who did not have any children of their own and who wished to adopt a child but were precluded from doing so under the 1952 Act, if the mixed marriage included a Roman Catholic partner. It did not apply if it included two partners of any of the Protestant denominations. It has been alleged for some time that such people were being discriminated against and that, in particular, it was unfair to children who might be adopted by couples of mixed religions if they had the power or the right to adopt. As the Minister pointed out, and as I pointed out in the Seanad on the 29th June, 1972 on the Second Stage of the Adoption Bill, 1971, there is not now nor has there been for quite a long number of years any child who was eligible for adoption and suitable for adoption who failed to be adopted because of our laws. I do not think that point is sufficiently appreciated by many people who may have been taken in by the sort of campaign mounted in recent years by people who found fault, not just with that aspect of our adoption laws, but with numerous other aspects of them.

Any changes that are made now in this Bill will not, so far as this particular aspect of the matter is concerned, be of any assistance to any child. There is no child who is not adopted at the moment who will be adopted when this Bill is passed. We should be clear in our minds about this because the very people who have agitated for this particular change are those who in the next breath will say that the most important things are the rights of the child and that our legislation should be child-centred. In fact, their problem is that our existing legislation is child-centred and it is not centred on the interests of the prospective adoptive parents. Let us be brutally frank and honest about it.

The change which is proposed here, and which I indicated, as reported in column 163 of Volume 73 of the Seanad Report, I would make is not being made in the interests of the children. It is being made in the interests of prospective adopting parents only. If one is to establish any sort of hierarchy of rights any reasonable person would say that the paramount individual concern is the child, that next in line so far as rights are concerned is the natural mother, and that very far down the list, if they have any rights at all, come prospective adoptors. I do not say adoptors because they have rights once they have adopted but prospective adoptors have no rights. They are given rights in law to adopt which they would not otherwise have had but they have no natural right to adopt. It is no harm that we should remind ourselves of that fact because if one was to read certain newspapers in recent years, and the literature produced by some groups, one would believe that there is a natural right on the part of prospective adoptors to adopt, whereas, in fact, there is no such thing.

If the adoption of a child makes any couple happy well and good provided that the child itself is happy. The happiness of an adopting couple should be purely subsidiary and ancillary to the happiness of the child concerned. Those who have a lot to say about that should bear in mind that that is the order of priorities and that prospective adoptors come at the very foot of the ladder and until such time as they adopt they have no rights at all.

I should like to quote what I said in the Seanad as reported in the Seanad Report, column 163, Volume 73:

Nevertheless, I have decided to include in a Bill which I will promote, a provision that would permit such couples to adopt if one of them is of the same religion as the child and its mother, if—but only if—the mother consents to adoption by such a couple. I propose to make a provision of the same kind in the case of orphans of parents of different religions.

When I read section 3 of this Bill, and I read it in the context of the repeal of section 12 of the 1952 Act and of section 6 of the 1964 Act, it seemed to me that it would be necessary for the mother to be informed of the religion of the prospective adoptors in every case. However, the Minister realises that and proposes to delete it. I am glad that what may have been an error in that section has been spotted and it will be dealt with.

In the last couple of months we had the freak case which was referred to by Deputy Andrews. In that case, in most unusual circumstances, the natural mother of the child was precluded from adopting her own child on her subsequent marriage. One could not but have, and I am sure the Adoption Board also had, the greatest of sympathy for the mother and her husband who were faced with this problem. It was most unpleasant and difficult but it is no harm to emphasise that that was a freak situation and that the number of times that could arise would, perhaps, be one in 100,000.

It may be more often.

I doubt it very much if the mother of an illegitimate would subsequently marry a man of a different religion who was prepared to adopt that child and then find themselves in that difficulty. Perhaps it has happened once before and it will happen again but that situation has been dealt with now. However, it is no harm to bear in mind that it was a very unusual situation because it was a combination of circumstances that might conceivably never happen again.

What I am not altogether clear about is the precise extent of that judgment. As reported in the newspapers, it appears that the whole of section 12 of the 1952 Act fell as a result of that judgment. Unfortunately, newspaper reports, apart from The Times of London, of court cases are notoriously unreliable and I have long since given up relying on them. I have not had an opportunity of reading the judgment itself but it seems to me that it is scarcely logical that the whole of section 12 had to fall from the facts of that case. If the whole of section 12 did not have to fall, the question arises whether it is necessary or appropriate to repeal it and the consequential section 6 of the 1964 Act. There may be people who are of the opinion that its total repeal is necessary, subject only to the enactment of section 3 here which it is proposed to amend. It may be the opinion of some that we are going too far on that. However, this is something that I might discuss more profitably on Committee Stage since I have not the judgment before me but, perhaps, when the Minister is replying to this stage he will deal with this point.

I take it that since section 12 as a whole is now being repealed the problem I referred to in 1972 no longer arises, that is, the question of orphans of parents of different religions. I assume that to be so but I would like the Minister's confirmation of it because these were the most unfortunate people of all. Up to now these were the only children in the country, who, being suitable otherwise, were not eligible for adoption. I expect there were very few of them. Indeed, I am not aware of there ever having been any such case but, potentially, there could always have been children in this position. In 1972 I was more concerned about such children than I was about the other side of the coin, so to speak, because they had certain rights of which the law was tending to deprive them. I await the Minister's confirmation that the repeal of section 12 covers such children. It should be spelled out in the Bill that it is open to a couple of the same religion as the religion of one of the natural parents of an orphan to adopt. Otherwise if the orphan children of a couple who were of different religions are free to be adopted anywhere or by anyone because there is no one to give consent, they may be adopted by a couple who are of a different religion from each of the two religions of the parents of the orphans.

This is a matter that could give rise to some problems but I am glad that we are able to talk here today about these difficulties without having any outside pressures of the type referred to by the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs. It is doubtful that we could have had such a debate 20 years ago. So far as I am aware no groups other than those to which Deputy Andrews referred have made any representations in relation to the Bill. I am not unhappy that that is so.

I am glad to see that section 4 tightens the restrictions regarding the making of arrangements for adoption because up to now it has been possible for people who were unqualified and who, in many ways, might have been unsuitable, to arrange for the adoption of children. One aspect of that which concerns me particularly is that it appears that some children who are suitable for adoption go out of this country for adoption. That appears to be contrary to a section in the 1952 Act but notwithstanding that it appears that this happens occasionally. Ten or 20 years ago it was a much more frequent happening than it is now but it should not happen at all. It is regrettable that any child should go out of the country for adoption other than to a relative particularly when there is a shortage of children for adoption here and while there is a considerable surplus of prospective adoptive parents. One would hope that with the more stringent restrictions on the placement of children for adoption as proposed in the substituted section 34 of the 1952 Act, there would be no further instances of that practice. I note from the Minister's speech that the board were of the opinion that they should not have any specific power to make regulations in relation to adoption societies and that they considered their existing power to deregister a society to be adequate. However, the Minister should be cognisant of the fact that of the 25 or so adoption societies in existence here, some are incomparably better than others. There are a number of reasons why this is so but the obvious one is the better training of members and staff. There is an enormous difference in efficiency between various societies and it might be borne in mind by the board that in so far as possible they should encourage an equally high standard of efficiency and care on the part of all societies registered with them. I agree that the power to deregister a society is adequate but it would be invidious for them to have to set out a series of standards that would have to be complied with by each society.

The placement of a child for adoption is a unique and special task, a task that may well be different in each case. In many ways it is for the people involved a very subjective exercise and one that is difficult to classify objectively.

I am disappointed that there is no explanatory memorandum with the Bill because without having the 1952 and 1964 Acts before one, it is not easy to understand what is contained in the Bill. Without an explanatory memorandum one would have to go through the Bill deleting those parts that are proposed to be deleted and adding what is proposed to be added while bearing in mind that the 1964 Act made some changes in the 1952 Act. It would be helpful in relation to Bills of this kind which, in the main, consist of amending legislation, to have an explanatory memorandum indicating what would be the effects of the proposed changes. Otherwise there is an enormous amount of work involved and it is only after a good deal of study that one realises the exact meaning of particular sections, whereas one could have grasped the meaning immediately with the aid of an explanatory memorandum.

The next aspect of the Bill with which I wish to deal is the proposal to lower the age of the child at which the natural mother may give her consent for adoption. On 29th June, 1972 I said in the Seanad that I proposed to reduce this age to three months but I have no objection to its being reduced here to six weeks because I have met a number of adoptive parents with whom children had been placed but who went through a very harrowing time while awaiting the making of the final adoption order. I met such parents within the last 48 hours. These people might be misled by the fact that it is stated in section 6 that consent can be given after six weeks. That is not the end of it. Section 7 goes on to say that:

...an adoption order shall not be made in respect of a child unless the child has been in the care of the applicants for such period (if any) as may be prescribed.

Subsection (2) says:

The Board may, having regard to the particular circumstances of the case, make an adoption order in respect of a child notwithstanding that the child has not been in the care of the applicants for the period prescribed pursuant to subsection (1) of this section.

The Minister mentioned in his opening speech that the board thought the minimum desirable period would be 6 months. Therefore, it may well be that if that period were insisted on by the board as a general rule, the waiting period for the making of the final adoption order would not be less in practice, notwithstanding the passage of section 6 of this Bill by the Oireachtas. If it will not be less than it is at the moment, I think that would be wrong. The reason I decided in the first instance, and the Minister subsequently decided, to shorten it even more, was the distress caused to the people who had adopted a child and become extremely attached to that child within a very short time. They lived in horror of the day that the child might be taken away from them. In every sense the child was their own, except in the purely physiological sense. The Minister is in danger, if section 7 is to be used in the way he has suggested, of undoing the good which section 6 might do from the point of view of adoptive parents with whom placement has been made. On the other hand, it would be very unwise not to have a reasonable period of probation, as it was described by the Minister, so that the board and their officials can be satisfied that, in fact, the placement is for the benefit of the child and that the adoptive parents are suitable.

Section 8 provides for altering the form of entering a child in the register of adopted children. The proposed alteration is that it can be altered by the Minister for Justice with the consent of the Minister for Health. Apparently, it was at his request that this was put in. I understand that the register of adopted children is a different register, although it is kept by the Registrar General, from the ordinary birth register. It would be no harm to suggest that some form might be devised whereby a birth certificate could be provided for adopted children which would not disclose to them, or to anyone else, the fact that they were adopted. I know there are problems in this regard. The shorter form of birth certificate does not disclose this. There are various instances when the longer form of certificate is insisted upon. The Minister should ask the Minister for Health to see if any way can be devised whereby that problem can be surmounted, because is causes difficulties to children. I know of a child of nine or ten years of age who is unaware of the particular circumstances in which he was adopted and is unaware of the fact that he was adopted. He is liable to have this disclosed to him now by some officious people who insist on having the long form of birth certificate produced.

I am glad to see that there is provision to appoint a deputy chairman under this Bill. I remember on a number of occasions having to run to the Government at the last minute with a four line memorandum saying that the chairman was ill. I began to resent the fact that it was necessary for them to make an order. I do not blame them for that. I am glad to see also that if the deputy chairman acts for the chairman he will be paid.

While on that topic, I agree with what the Minister and Deputy Andrews said in relation to the members of this board who, with the exception of the chairman, and, in future, the deputy chairman, are unremunerated. It is not a question of meeting for a few hours once a month. This board often meets on three or four days a week. On those days it is not a nominal meeting which begins at 11 o'clock and the members go for coffee at 11.10. It is a hard slog all day from 11 a.m. to possibly 5 p.m., frequently with a lot of difficult decisions to be made which are of grave importance to the people involved. We have been fortunate, through the years, that we had people of great competence and generosity who were prepared to undertake this onerous work without remuneration of any kind. The people of this country are indebted to them to a far greater extent than they are, or ever will be, aware of.

There are a number of other points to which I should like to refer but they might profitably wait until the Committee Stage. This Bill is generally on the lines on which I spoke in 1972 and hoped to produce at that time. This Bill goes beyond that and brings in other things on which I was not very keen at that stage and did not propose to bring in but to which I have no fundamental objection in any event.

The Minister spoke about the orders of the High Court regarding the custody of children which is referred to in section 2. He said that he thought that at the moment the High Court was the proper tribunal or forum for decisions on such matters. He also mentioned that he thought ultimately that some form of family tribunal, if and when they came about, might be the more suitable forum for deciding certain questions, such as the custody of children. I doubt whether such a tribunal would be the proper place to reach such decisions. I am reminded of my doubts in that respect by what I said at column 160 of the Seanad Report on 29th June, 1972, when it was proposed in the section of the Bill which we were then discussing to give the Adoption Board the power to decide on the custody of the children as opposed to the power to make adoption orders. I said:

This proposal too raises a fundamental constitutional problem. It is extremely doubtful whether the power to determine the right to custody of a child in case of dispute is a limited power within the meaning of article 37 of the Constitution. It is only if it were held to be such that the power could lawfully be entrusted to a body other than a Court of Law.

I suggest that there is no prospect of the question of the custody of a child ever being held to be a limited function in the context within the meaning of Article 37 of our Constitution.

It is a very important matter when one bears in mind that the jurisdiction of the High Court is £2,000 and upwards. The question of whether a man gets £2,000 damages or not as a result of an accident or a breach of contract is very trivial compared with the question of who will have custody of a child. One knows that these sort of cases are often fought very bitterly by the natural mother who may not have looked after the child as well as she should have done but who, nonetheless, has strong maternal interests for her own child and who will do anything not to give up that child. The High Court is probably the lowest tribunal which should properly decide an important matter like that. I do not see any prospect of its ever being held to be a limited power within the meaning of Article 37 of our Constitution. I would certainly hope that it never would be so. It would be most inappropriate that something of such fundamental importance as the custody of a child between two disputing parents or between a natural mother and certain outsiders should be ever decided by a district justice. It would be even less suitable to have such a matter decided by a tribunal of social workers, or whoever might constitute a family tribunal. They might be very suitable indeed for dealing with many of the matters which come before them from day to day, but I doubt very much, even if a district justice were to preside over such a tribunal, whether they would be the proper forum for the decision of such fundamental matters as the custody of a child.

I do not think there is anything further I want to say at this stage. I will be interested to hear what the Minister has to say in reply. I reiterate what I said at the outset. I regard our adoption system as an excellent one. It has proved itself over 22 years. The changes which it is now proposed to make in it are, in fact, minor changes of very little significance. Perhaps they are changes following public notoriety rather than changes of real merit. The need for change was very slight. Such slight changes as were necessary are being made in this Bill. They will get over the small number of anomalies which appeared from time to time in relation to the administration of our adoption laws.

For that reason I welcome the Bill particularly as it is more or less in line with what I had suggested myself. I would caution people against thinking that there is more in the Bill than is really there.

I agree with nearly all the speakers. This Bill is overdue. As Deputy O'Malley said, there are very few points at which change is necessary. These changes are necessary because the position in regard to them is serious.

I agree also with Deputy O'Malley that when a Bill is introduced there should be an explanatory memorandum with it, no matter how small the Bill is. There are meetings in the House and in the EEC. Deputies have to attend the Council of Europe. Deputations come in to meet Ministers. All these functions take time. A Deputy finds he is tied up with jobs or meetings concerning by-elections, and so on. Deputies should get an explanatory memorandum with each Bill to show exactly what is intended. The details of the Bill should be spelled out. An overall document should be given.

Deputy O'Malley spoke about the recent High Court case before Mr. Justice Pringle. It may have been an unusual case in this country but many similar cases occur in England, America and European countries. We often follow Europe as regards business matters.

Like many other people in Ireland or elsewhere I knew very little about adoption until I became a Deputy. The first time I took an interest in the subject was when constituents came to me with their problems in this regard. This is mainly a city problem. Most adoptions take place in towns and urban areas. In the country a farmer prefers to take a nephew into his home rather than adopt a child. Such people feel that there is some slur on their marriage if they cannot produce a child. In Dublin there are not enough children available for those who wish to adopt them. I agree with Deputy O'Malley that children should not be adopted by people who live outside the country. There is an improvement in the control of adoption societies. There is a provision in the Bill in regard to adoption where the adoptive parents are of different religions.

For a number of years past we have adopted the practice of putting Irish names on boards set up by the Government. We are not all legal men or professors. Not everyone has a university education. As a politician I know where to get information but what about the people who leave school at 15 years of age and who go into employment immediately? How are they to know how to get information and how to find these boards in the telephone directory? They have to come back to the politicians to find out how to contact the various boards. We have Bord na gCapall, and so on. I left school at 18 and between then and 1963 I did not hear much Irish. People who leave school at 15 are not aware of the Irish titles of the various State agencies. Such boards should have their names in the telephone directory in both English and Irish. An Bord Uchtála should be listed under the Adoption Board also. When people want money they know that they have to contact the IDA. We are just playing with Irish here. It is a bit unfair. I have not used Irish for ages. In my constituency the Protestant clergyman happens to know more Irish than the Catholic priest. The use of Irish can sometimes give a rich person an advantage over a poor person.

There are a few points I have come across in my political life in regard to adoption. The standards for adoption societies should be strict. There should be safeguards to ensure that adoption societies are not used for the conversion of a child to a certain religion. That certainly happened before the 1962 Act. I know of two cases — one Catholic and the other Protestant — where the adopted child was converted to the particular religion of the adoptive parents.

It would be a good thing to have specialists. I agree with both Deputy Andrews and the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs in this. I am not a great believer in professional people; sometimes I think we have too many of them. What we want is a mixture of the professional and those experienced on the ground. As Deputy Andrews said, the professional should be top class and used only in the assessing of the adoptive parents. After all, when one goes to buy a business one employs an expert to assess the value of the business.

The argument so far has been that there are not enough children for adoption. Up to a point that may be true. There are cases in which people have adopted more than one child and they have to go through the same procedure for each successive child. That should not be necessary. I also know of a mixed marriage where the couple were very anxious to adopt but could not do so under existing legislation. I really think that the important thing is that the child should be reared as a Christian and given a good start in life. The difficulty could be met by getting the mother of the illegitimate child to say in what religion she wants the child to be reared.

I have not had time to go into this subject very deeply, but my constituents have advised me about certain things. I knew a case of a girl of 16 or 17 who had an illegitimate baby. She was kept in a home while she was having the baby and she agreed to have the child adopted. When she left the home she got a job and then she changed her mind and wanted to keep the child herself. The home told her she could not have the child until she paid six weeks' maintenance. I do not know what happened because the girl never came back to me. I suggest that some of the money the Minister is getting now could be used to help people in her particular position.

This Bill is an improvement on former legislation. I congratulate the Minister on it. So far there has been no dissentient voice.

I welcome this Bill and any criticism I offer will be offered for a constructive purpose. First of all, I congratulate the board on the magnificent work they have done to date. In certain cases they have come up against considerable difficulties. This Bill is evidence of that and it seeks now to resolve some of those difficulties. Compliments have been paid to the board. I doubt if the board really need these compliments from this House. They have been in existence for 22 years and have dealt with 20,000 cases of adoption. The only paid members are the chairman and the secretary. A great deal of the work of the board is done voluntarily and we, on behalf of our constituents, express now the thanks of the people for and their appreciation of what the board have done.

Deputy Andrews raised the question as to whether an adopted child should have the right to know who its parents are. I gather that information is not readily available and I would like to raise just one caveat. There is one possibility that can arise. Where two people have sexual relations they may produce a son and a daughter. Is it possible that that brother and sister could subsequently get married? Some procedure should be found to deal with that situation. Furthermore, when an adopted child reaches a certain age that child should know something about the background of the parents if he or she so wishes because people's attitudes change and I do not see why a child who has been adopted should be placed in a disadvantageous position vis-à-vis the parents. Some parents behave in a very extraordinary manner towards their children. We all know that; it is a fact of life and of human nature. A child should be in a position to protect himself and know where he stands. I can foresee the case of a child who might not be aware that he was adopted and who might suddenly, at a future date, have it thrown in his face that he was an illegitimate child. We must first of all look at this legislation from the point of view of the child. That is fundamental to this legislation and all thinking in relation to adoption.

I do not want to appear to be critical or carping but medical science has made tremendous strides in the examination of children and infants and, as a result of modern technology, doctors are very often able to ward off illnesses when they know that people are prone to certain illnesses by reason of hereditary or other factors. One case came to my knowledge where an adoption did go through, and the result was that the adopting parents were left with a child severely handicapped. It was not apparent to the parents at the time. Unfortunately, this fact has given rise to considerable family trauma. The fact came to light fairly soon after the adoption. I think adoptive parents are not sufficiently geared to deal with adverse circumstances of that nature. Possibly extra care should be taken in the checking of health, both physical and mental, of the child. There are now many tests available. I am sure they are availed of and this might have been an unfortunate case. But, as we are talking very frankly here and trying to be constructive. I would be lacking in my duty if I did not refer to the fact that such a possibility might arise.

When looking at this legislation we must bear in mind that the only children we are considering in this matter are illegitimate and orphaned. I was a little disheartened listening to the Minister. I know he is trying to go as far as he can to be as helpful as possible, as is everybody else in this case, but I was a little depressed when I heard the advice he had been given. In his introductory speech he said:

It has been contended on many occasions that abandoned or neglected children whose parents are living should be capable of being adopted.

He went on to say:

It is difficult to answer the criticism that an abandoned or neglected child is better in a new home than in an institution neglected by its natural parents.

The Minister continued:

I sympathise completely with the humanity of that plea.

I do not think anybody could do otherwise. The Minister also said:

I am advised, however, that the inalienable and imprescriptible rights guaranteed to the family by the Constitution make it impossible to extend the benefits of adoption to children whose parents are still living.

I always become somewhat concerned when I hear the words "inalienable" and "imprescriptible" used. If a child is abandoned or neglected, have not the parents, in relation to that child, thrown away their rights to be called normal parents? I think there is room in this legislation, despite the wording of the Constitution and despite what any judge may have said in relation to certain parts of the Constitution, for better cognisance to be taken of the judicial rule which is referred to in Professor J.M. Kelly's — as he was then — book on the Constitution when discussing the Guardianship of Infants Act, 1954, where he states that:

Statutory force has now been given to the judicial rule that "the welfare of the child is paramount" in cases involving the custody and education of children.

I do not see why the welfare of the child is paramount in relation to two facets only, namely, the custody and education of the child. We have to deal with the entire life and ambit of the child when we are considering adoption. The Minister makes the point that the guardianship of the child can be protected under the Guardianship of Infants Act. If that Act can be used to retain possession, custody and education of the child, why should not that child be entitled to the full benefit of the care and attention of the person who is now the guardian in law by virtue of an order made under that Act? Why should the child be denied the benefits of the name of those people who have befriended him and have acted as his parents? With respect to those who have expressed views on the Constitution I think they have taken a biased and narrow view. Parents and families have rights and they have those rights only when they act as such because Article 60 of our Constitution says:

All citizens shall, as human persons, be held equal before the law.

I do not see why the adoption, use of a name and the benefits that adoption bring should be restricted merely to illegitimate or orphaned children. In effect, the child who has been abandoned or neglected is an orphan; the fact that its parents are alive does not change the actual circumstances of that unfortunate child. I think it is time this House took a step forward in that regard and took cognisance of the fact that parents who abandon their children have not, in law, the right to call themselves the parents of those children. They may be the parents in name, in the sense of using a name in a very ephemeral sort of way because, although they have rights — and I am talking about ordinary parents — they also have duties. It is a fundamental principle and interpretation of law that if a person has a right to something, he has also obligations and duties.

In considering this measure I think the Minister will have to consider section 10 of the 1952 Adoption Act and I suggest he should make some provision that where a certain person is given custody of a child under the Guardianship of Infants Act, after a due length of time the child and the guardian should have the right to get a full order under the Adoption Act. This is only fair to the child. We live in an age of form-filling, producing birth and other certificates and is a child to go through life and be regarded as not wanted by its parents and not fully integrated with its guardian? It is our duty to take the place of the family structure and provide machinery to allow the child to have a full life.

It has come to my knowledge recently that there can be difficulty following adoption. I may be speaking incorrectly and contrary to what is in the two Adoption Acts and the full meaning of the new Bill, but adoptive parents are human and an adoption home can break up. I think the effect of the Adoption Act is that once the child is adopted the adoptive parents are the parents of that child. I should like the Minister to say if there is any legal machinery to permit a once-adopted child to be readopted to cover such a situation. I know of a case that has arisen in the environs of Dublin recently which is giving some cause for concern.

I should like to thank all who contributed to this debate for the content of their contributions and especially for the spirit in which they were offered. This is a sensitive area and it has been sensitively handled by the House. I think it was Deputy O'Malley who said that there was nothing revolutionary in the Bill and that was because the general code of adoption had been successful and did not require revolutionary changes. That is correct. A large number of orders have been made and it is obvious that, at least, in terms of quantity, adoption has worked. We have not had any research into adoption to assess its impact on the children and adoptive parents and we cannot talk in terms of success shown by research carried out in the area, but it would be a fair inference that in a society as small as ours, 20,000 orders could not have been made and have been absorbed into our society unless they were successful. If that number of orders was throwing up social or domestic problems they would surely have manifested themselves and would have come to our notice. I think we can claim that the system has worked well. That is not to say that it is perfect and that is why we have this amending Bill here today.

To take up first the contribution by Deputy Esmonde, I think the burden of his contribution concerned the plight of the abandoned child. He took me up on the point I made in my opening speech that the abandoned child is not capable of being the subject of an adoption order because of the constistitutional position concerning the inalienable and imprescriptible right of the family. I would respectfully say to Deputy Esmonde that his human heart ran away with his legal head here. There is no doubt that our constitutional position at present prevents adoption of abandoned children and once that is so we in this House, no matter how much we may regret the absence of that right on humanitarian grounds — and I share Deputy Esmonde's sympathy for this class of children — have no right to ignore the basic law of the State. What would have to be done would be to change that basic law and this would be a complicated procedure. From the judicial precedents available to us — and these are scarce — it would seem that it would not be even possible to put a judicial gloss or interpretation on the Constitution to achieve what the human instinct in us wants to achieve in particular cases. Having to argue like this, I am a cockshot for people who say: "Surely you cannot put forward such a callous point of view and stand over it." Unfortunately we are circumscribed by our constitutional position and we must be realistic even if the realism appears to be callous and hurtful.

There is a point of principle in getting to the root of the argument concerning the abandoned child. Deputy Esmonde touched on it when he spoke of such a child being in the custody of foster parents for some time, getting all the benefits of an ordered home and of paternal and maternal love that it was denied by its own natural parents and he said that after "due length of time" in the custody of the foster parents, why not have provision for an adoption order to be made automatically? Who is to define "due length of time"? This is where we have a practical difficulty in changing the law to admit abandoned children within the ambit of the Adoption Acts. Who is to say that a child has been finally, totally and absolutely abandoned by his natural parents? There could be a situation in which that child's natural parents, as a result of changed social or economic circumstances might find themselves in a position to offer the love the child lacked from them up to then and to offer proper and complete home environment to their own child and would it not then be a difficult situation — to put it at the mildest —if they were unable to offer their own natural child all the benefits of his own home if the child had been taken irrevocably from them by an adoption order made under the Acts? This is a practical difficulty in regard to abandoned children. As Deputy Esmonde pointed out, a custody order gives them everything except the legal name of their foster parents. It is not altogether an unsatisfactory situation. It is a difficult area and I do not propose to try to solve it here because I do not think we are in a position where we can solve it.

Deputies Andrews and Esmonde raised some points dealing with the question of the adopted child being told of his origins and they wondered if this was a good or a bad thing. Deputy Andrews mentioned the research carried out by Mr. Triseliotis who is attached to the University of Edinburgh in his book called "In Search of Origins". Deputy Esmonde thought information should be available for the child so that he would be aware of his ancestry and that this might possibly prevent what I thought was an extreme example, the dangers of an incestuous union at a future date. I suppose it cannot be absolutely guarded against. On the other hand, we have to balance that unlikely event against the question marks that are necessarily raised if one is to reveal the identity to the adopted child.

Most research has shown that it is in the interest of the adopted child to be told as early as possible that he is adopted. The experience of adoptive parents has been that by and large this does not produce a curiosity on the part of the child regarding his natural ancestry. Research has shown that in cases where adopted children have shown such a curiosity the homes of the adoptive parents have not been stable ones, but that where the adopted children had been reared in steady environments with stable parents they have had no curiosity regarding their natural ancestry. It is basic to our adoption code that the adopted child becomes the child of the adopting parents in everything except the natural blood. It would be contrary to that principle if we allowed to be introduced into that relationship curiosity or questions concerning the natural ancestry of the child. We want to ensure that the family together with the adopted child becomes as far as possible a natural family, bonded in terms of natural love as the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs said. We want to achieve that aim and it would be going against that if we were to facilitate information regarding the ancestry of the adopted child to be given to him. So far as possible we want to make him the child of the adoptive parents and this is a reason for having our code of adoption as it is, preserving the secrecy of his origin from the child.

Deputy Andrews spoke of the need for assessment before placement. He said the need for this had been made clear to him in conversations he had after the Bill was published and in his general research into this matter. I share the view that assessment is needed and I have covered this aspect in my speech by indicating my concern that the highest calibre of professional assistance be available to adoption societies. I said that subventions to enable them to employ this kind of assistance would be made available to them. It is up to them to decide the qualifications of the persons coming to work for them but I hope they will look for persons with professional qualifications. Deputy Andrews was critical of the wording of the advertisement placed by my Department seeking welfare officers in which it referred to a good general education with experience and/or training in social work. That does not exclude professional social workers. There is no bias against a professional qualification in social science; in fact, we welcome such people into the public service and I know adoption societies are anxious to avail of their services. As I have said, I am arranging for subventions to be paid to the societies to enable them to recruit social workers.

Deputy Andrews raised the point that it might be desirable to have a system of visits after the adoption order has been made. This is controversial and I think that essentially it is unacceptable. It is basic to our adoption code that when the adoption order is made the child is then the child of the adopting parent. It would be an invasion of the privacy of that family for the State, via the Adoption Board, to introduce a system of compulsory visits. If the assessment is thorough before and after placement and before the adoption order it should have removed any doubts and cleared everyone's mind regarding the suitability of the family to adopt. If one says there should be postadoption visits in the case of adopted children, logically one should argue for similar visits in the case of natural families. It would be too controversial and the only circumstances in which I could see such visits would be for research purposes and on a voluntary basis. As I indicated in my opening speech after 20 years of operation of the Acts, I am keen to see some research carried out into the Irish experience of adoption. This will necessarily involve visiting homes where there have been adoptions and the success and depth of the research will depend on the co-operation made available by adoptive parents. For reasons of privacy many of them will be hesitant in co-operating with that research and this is one of the factors that makes research into this matter more difficult. Another factor is the tremendous time-lag and changing social conditions and attitudes towards adoption. Deputy Belton touched on this matter when he said that until comparatively recently adoptions were rare in rural Ireland, that they were confined generally to cities and large urban areas. That was due to an attitude of mind that is changing. It is indicative of how attitudes can change and this change can tend to invalidate research which must be carried out over a generation or half generation.

Speaking on this question of research, I am aware of the research document produced from the social science school in Trinity College. There was no request to me for funds to aid this research. I understand that arrangements for its publication have been made. I welcome this research and congratulate the researcher. It is probably the first such research project carried out in this country, and I hope it will be the first of many.

Some Deputies referred to the question of having specialists on the Adoption Board. Deputy Andrews felt that a proportion of the board should be composed of specialists in the adoption field. The Minister for Posts and Telegraphs took an opposite view. I would share the view of the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs. The place for the experts in this area is at the assessment and placement investigation levels, not on the Board. The essential qualities which the members of the board should have are stable personalities and common sense. We have been lucky in having boards composed of such persons.

It would be difficult to say which type of specialist should be on the board. Deputy Andrews suggested specialists in adoption work, but that is a wide field. Is it to be a paediatrician to look after medical matters, or a child psychiatrist, or the whiz-kids of the 20th century, or the sociologists. It is hard to know what speciality should be represented. There is the danger that, if a speciality is represented on the Board and the person knows he is there representing that speciality, his special point of view may be the one he feels he has to put forward at all times. This could mar the smooth running of the Board and conflict with the professional advice the Board might be getting from the adoption society worker or from their own social workers in a particular adoption. By and large, the arguments are in favour of having a non-specialist board, a board of mature people with common sense.

The Bill proposes to implement the recent findings of the High Court in regard to the prohibition on adoption by persons of mixed marriages. As a result of that decision that prohibition has been removed completely. Deputy O'Malley raised the question as to whether the entire section fell. What the court found was that section 12(2) was unconstitutional and, as the rest of the section depended on that subsection, the entire section fell. Deputy O'Malley made a point about that case. He said it was an unusual case. Deputy Belton disagreed and thought it was something that could happen.

There was a very unusual feature about it which probably brought it to the stage of litigation. If the child in that case was being reared in its mother's religion, its mother could have adopted it, though not jointly with her husband. What was unusual about this case was that the child was being reared not in the mother's religion but in that of her husband, who was not the father of the child. It was a most unusual situation and I think Deputy O'Malley would be more correct than Deputy Belton in saying that it is most unlikely to happen again. It highlighted this problem and it anticipated the change I was proposing. As I said, the Bill with the change in it was actually ordered for First Reading on the day the judgment was delivered.

Where a child is to be placed in a mixed marriage there will be need to inform and obtain the consent of the natural mother to such placement. That provision will be in the Bill when the amendment which I propose to bring in on Committee Stage is made. I was in some doubt as to whether this proviso should be there and I mentioned that doubt in my opening speech. Judging by the reaction of the House that doubt has been removed. I think it is a good proviso. No objection has been voiced to it. No doubt Deputies will give it further consideration between now and Committee Stage.

The reasons for having that proviso are good. It might inhibit placement altogether if mothers felt that their children would be placed in mixed marriages, unless they knew in advance and their consent was given. If there was no provision for obtaining their consent and they knew that mixed marriages were eligible for receiving children, some mothers, for conscientious reasons, might not want to place their children at all. As I am a firm believer in adoption, I should not like to see that consequence. Even in the case of mothers who, at the time of placement, would not have worries on that score, they might subsequently develop scruples. I would like to obviate that as much as possible. It is a second valid reason for maintaining the proviso. However, as I say, Deputies will have time to consider the point further between now and Committee Stage. I will be interested to hear further views, if there are any on this point.

Deputy O'Malley raised the point that the custody of the child is of such fundamental importance that the only forum competent and proper to decide such questions is the High Court. I agree that this is extremely serious and must be dealt with only in a court of high jurisdiction. In my opening speech I mentioned the possible advent of a family court and Deputy O'Malley interpreted this as meaning some sort of tribunal with social workers. This is not my concept of a family court. My concept is that it would be part of the courts under our Constitution. While I have no fixed ideas at this stage as to its rank or level, it certainly would not be a court of inferior jurisdiction. Deputy O'Malley can be assured that I share his opinion that the question of the custody of a child is of such fundamental importance that it must be dealt with only in a superior court.

He also raised the question of birth certificate in the hope that in the long form all reference to adoption, could be deleted. The short form, of course, does not contain any reference to adoption, but the long form does. If the principle of telling the child that he is adopted is invoked and practised at as early an age as possible, so that the child comes to terms with his status from a very early age and it assumes a naturalness for him, I do not think there would be any difficulties or that any hurtful or harmful situation could be caused to a child in the event of having to use the long birth certificate.

The occasions demanding the production of the long certificate are few. We have to consider the other point of view that the long form of birth certificates are birth records and one of the reasons for having them is to enable people to trace their ancestors. If their accuracy, so to speak, were to be diluted by deleting references to adopted children where such references were pertinent, the accuracy of our records for research and inheritence purposes would disappear. This is a contrary point of view. It may be a rather harsh point of view in an emotional area but it has to be put forward. The difficulties of the situation can be met by the fact that the short certificate does not contain any reference to the adoptive status of the holder of a certificate. Secondly, parents should be encouraged, and are encouraged, to make sure that their children know from as early an age as they have sense to comprehend it that they are adopted children.

Deputy O'Malley raised the question of the removal of children abroad. This is prohibited in the 1952 Act, section 40 of which has stringent provisions in relation to the removal from the State of children. It was, however, right that it should be raised so that the matter could be kept under observation.

Deputy Andrews queried the meaning of the second part of section 6, that is, the new form of section 15 (1) and he asked what exactly it meant. The object of it is not to have a consent hanging in the air. Deputy Andrews said that this point had been referred to him by people in the adoption world but I should like to point out that this is a repeat of what was in the earlier Act. In practice most consents are given after the application for adoption so that the provision in practice will have relevance only in cases where the person giving consent knows the adopters.

Deputies Andrews and O'Malley raised the question of the probationary period and said that, while we have reduced the age at which consent to adoption can be given to six weeks, this does not necessarily mean that the adoption order would be made any sooner than they are being made because the probationary period of six months is being provided for. However, this probationary period is not mandatory. It is desirable in the board's view as being the minimum period within which the board can be satisfied that the placement is proper and that the child and parents are adjusting to each other and that a successful adoption is the likely outcome of that placement. It is a precautionary, desirable measure and for parents who have to go through the uncertainty of that six months it is a time of stress and strain but it is unavoidable so that proper assessment can be made.

The board have power in cases where they feel that a probationary period could be dispensed with or shortened to dispense with it or to shorten it. When the Bill becomes law one could, in theory, have a consent and an adoption made within seven weeks of the birth of the child. That legal situation is opened up by the change in the Bill.

Deputy Esmonde mentioned the necessity for careful medical screening. The board is well aware of this and does have a system of medical screening of adopted children to ensure that they are healthy before being placed for adoption but it is only as efficient as the persons providing the service. It can happen that an obscure case of handicap might escape even the closest observation and the most meticulous diagnosis. I agree that should that only come to light after the adoption has been made and the child cannot be returned it is a very traumatic experience for the adopting parents to find that they have a mentally handicapped child on their hands. The board is well aware of the importance of accurate medical screening in advance of adoption.

There was criticism that this Bill was not accompanied by an explanatory memorandum. This was made by Deputies O'Malley and Belton who complained of the difficulty and of the delay of having to read the Bill in conjunction with two earlier Acts. I sympathise with their point of view but I think an explanatory memorandum would not cure that difficulty because if it was to ease the situation it would have to have within it the earlier Acts so that all would be within the same cover. However, it would not ease the difficulty of reading what is a fairly technical piece of law. I was anxious that the Bill would not be controversial and an explanatory memorandum necessarily would have to put forward points of view in an area that could be controversial. It was important to avoid that in this particular Bill but I take their points that it was a pity that it was not forthcoming but I do not think it would have improved the contributions because they were of a high level and the Bill was well understood by Deputies.

I suggest that my opening speech discharged what an explanatory memorandum sets out to do. It explains the thinking behind the Bill and the provisions in it but it had to be assimilated there and then because the debate is an ongoing process.

Deputy Belton criticised the title of An Bord Uchtála. It is not as bad as some Irish versions, the worst one that comes to mind is An Bord Dumpála. It has not reached that low level but, nevertheless, I take his point that people who may need to get in touch with the board in a hurry unless the name is also in the telephone directory in English translation might have some difficulty. I presume the name is in English also in the telephone directory but if it is not I will arrange that it be inserted in English in the next issue.

All Deputies joined with me in congratulating those in the adoption field, the members of the board, for the vast amount of voluntary work they carry out and defended them from much of the criticism they have to endure and suffer in silence because the members of the board cannot become involved in public controversy. It is galling, I know, for them to read and hear criticism that is inaccurate and made without the full comprehension of the subject or the difficulties attending to the subject. These people are deserving of our thanks.

Likewise, all the voluntary workers who comprise the adoption societies up and down the country and all the staff attached to the Adoption Board and the adoption societies are deserving of our thanks. Deputy Andrews made reference to the involvement of the Department of Justice with the Adoption Board. I should like to set the record straight, the Department of Justice is not involved with the Adopttion Board beyond the fact that it comes within the general aegis of the Department. The Adoption Board are independent in their operations and it is my desire that that independence be maintained. In fact they have real independence, and this is one of the reasons that has contributed to their success.

In congratulating and thanking all the people who have contributed to that success we should pay tribute also to the 20,000 sets of parents who have adopted children so successfully and harmoniously during the past 20 years. These people deserve the thanks of the nation for providing stable and secure homes for all these children who, otherwise, would have been condemned to an institutional life or at least to life in homes where they would not have the benefits of full legal adoption. The case for the abandoned child was put very sympathetically and eloquently by Deputy Esmonde. Whether the motive for adoption is the one of having the delight of a child in the home or whether it is solely for the purpose of giving a home to a child, all those parents deserve our thanks. As has been said during the debate there are now more would-be adoptive parents than there are children available. However, there is a class of child that can be neglected. I refer to the child that is handicapped physically. The greatest act of love that adoptive parents could demonstrate would be to adopt one of these children because the task of rearing such a child requires a high degree of dedication. No one would be expected to adopt a child that was severely mentally handicapped because children in that category require institutional care and are condemned by their medical condition to life in an institution. There are also children who are suffering from the handicap of being of mixed race. Sometimes these are forgotten; so it is no harm to avail of the opportunity of this discussion to draw the attention of persons who may be waiting for a long time for children to the existence of these other children who are not normally put forward for adoption but who have to be requested specially.

I thank the House for the sympathetic and constructive way in which the Bill has been received.

Question put and agreed to.
Committee Stage ordered for Wednesday, 19th June, 1974.
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