Irish government admits defeat over referendums on family and women’s roles

Published

8 months ago

March 9, 2024

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The Irish government has been defeated in the twin referendums on changing the country’s constitution, prime minister Leo Varadkar has conceded.

Mr Varadkar, who said he wanted to remove “very old-fashioned language” in his country’s constitution, said it was clear the amendments were “defeated comprehensively on a respectable turnout”.

“It was our responsibility to convince the majority of people to vote ‘yes’ and we clearly failed to do so,” he said.

Earlier, transport minister Eamon Ryan said the government “didn’t convince the public of the argument for a ‘yes, yes’ vote”.

Mr Ryan said: “You have to respect the voice of the people. It’s a complex issue, both are complex.

“I would have preferred a ‘yes, yes’ (but) I don’t accept that our campaign did go wrong.”

The family amendment had proposed extending the meaning of “family” beyond marriage, instead including households based on “durable” relationships.

The care amendment proposed deleting references to the centrality of a woman’s “life within the home” and mothers’ “duties in the home” when providing care, replacing them with an article acknowledging the importance of family members in general, without defining them by gender.

Changes to the constitution must be approved by Irish citizens through a national vote, which happened on Friday, with results expected on Saturday evening.

The Irish government campaigned for ‘yes’ votes to both amendments, saying the changes would get rid of sexist language, recognise family care and extend protection to more families.

But commentators have said the proposal to spread the burden of care for family members with disabilities to the entire family from only the woman became a row about the extent or willingness of the state to support carers.

A ‘yes’ vote win had been thought possible as opinion polls suggested support for the ‘yes’ side on both votes.

In the end, there was a low turnout reported throughout the day, with some areas understood to have seen fewer than 30% of registered voters and it is thought voter numbers remained lower compared to previous referendums.

Senator Michael McDowell, a former tanaiste (second-highest ranking member of the Irish government) and ex-justice minister, campaigned for a ‘no, no’ vote, describing the proposals as “unwise social experimentation” with the constitution.

He said: “I trust individual voters – they looked at what was being put before them and they said ‘no’.

“Many of them will have a slightly different perspective as to why they were voting ‘no’, but in the end we live in a republic and the sovereign power is the people and every individual vote is as good as anybody else’s vote and this is an emphatic repudiation of what I think was unwise social experimentation with the constitution.”

Sinn Fein, which is currently leading the polls ahead of the next general election, also supported a ‘yes, yes’ vote and blamed the government.

Party leader Mary Lou McDonald said: “If there is one big takeaway message from this, it is that support for people with disabilities as full and equal citizens and support for carers is something that has to be taken seriously by government.”

A slam dunk, but the government dropped the ball

For years, actually decades, everyone in Ireland knew the outdated “women” language in the constitution would be eventually be ditched by referendum.

It was just a matter of timing and wording really.

This is a modern and fairly liberal European democracy, gradually shedding the vestiges of conservative Catholic control by popular vote. Divorce, same-sex marriage, abortion. All gone, all by referendum.

Language drawn up by men born in the 1800s, referencing a woman’s life and duties being in the home? Easy by comparison. No government could mess this one up.

Enter Leo Varadkar and his hapless coalition.

This will be held up for many years as an example of how not to run a referendum campaign. Pay no attention to any international clickbait headlines declaring that on International Women’s Day, the Irish voted to keep women at home.

This wasn’t about the “sexist” language. It was about the government’s shambolic approach to the vote.

A reluctance to commit resources. Rejecting recommended replacement language in favour of vague aspirations that convinced no one. Poor messaging. And a perceived arrogance and complacency toward the electorate.

Replacing marriage as the family foundation with “durable relationships”, but not defining what on earth a durable relationship was? Ah sure, the courts will sort that one out, the people were told.

Ditching the sexist language, and replacing it with a vague commitment to “strive” to support family carers (who are mostly women)? What does that mean? How do you define “strive” in a legal sense? Do or do not, there is no try, according to Yoda, who definitely would have voted ‘no’.

The answers simply didn’t come, and history shows the Irish voters are more than happy to shoot down referendums when they don’t feel the tangible results to a Yes vote have been explained. Brexit would never have passed with Irish voters. They don’t do vague. Better the devil you know. Status quo prevails.

This was supposed to be the first of a string of feel-good results for Leo Varadkar’s government, ahead of an anticipated early general election. The main opposition party Sinn Fein have been slipping back substantially in polling.

A win in the referendums, good results in the local/European elections in June, a nice give-away budget in October, and boom – the election can be called. If that was indeed the plan, it’s fallen at the first hurdle.

Instead, Mr Varadkar heads off to Washington for the annual bout of St Patrick’s jollity at President Biden’s place, with a pair of ears as red as the shamrock is green.

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At least 10 dead after fire rips through retirement home in Spain

Published

6 hours ago

November 15, 2024

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At least 10 dead after fire rips through retirement home in Spain

At least 10 people have been killed after a fire broke out at a retirement home in northern Spain in the early hours of this morning, officials have said.

A further two people were seriously injured in the blaze at the residence in the town of Villafranca de Ebro in Zaragoza, according to the Spanish news website Diario Sur.

They remain in a critical condition, while several others received treatment for smoke inhalation.

Firefighters were alerted to the blaze at the residence – the Jardines de Villafranca – at 5am (4am UK time) on Friday.

Those who were killed in the fire died from smoke inhalation, Spanish newspaper Heraldo reported.

The residence is home to 82 elderly residents.

The blaze started in one of the rooms, Fernando Beltran, the national government’s top official in the region, told reporters.

All of the victims were elderly residents, he added.

Fire crews, paramedics and police officers remain on site, said a spokesperson for the regional government of Aragon who confirmed the fatalities.

It took firefighters several hours to extinguish the blaze, they said.

The cause of the fire is unknown and is being investigated.

World

COP29: UN climate summits ‘no longer fit for purpose’, warn leading figures

Published

8 hours ago

November 15, 2024

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COP29: UN climate summits 'no longer fit for purpose', warn leading figures

UN climate talks are “no longer fit for purpose” and should only be hosted by countries who are trying to give up fossil fuels, veterans of the process have said.

An open letter to the United Nations, signed by former UN chief Ban Ki-moon, made a dramatic intervention in the 29th COP climate summit, under way in Baku, Azerbaijan.

Frustration over petrostate hosts – following last year’s summit in UAE – as well as the influence of fossil fuel lobbyists, prohibitive costs, and slow progress have been mounting in recent years.

The letter acknowledges the strides COPs have made on ramping up climate policies.

“But it is now clear that the COP is no longer fit for purpose,” the authors said.

“Its current structure simply cannot deliver the change at exponential speed and scale, which is essential to ensure a safe climate landing for humanity.”

The letter’s 22 signatories also include former Ireland President Mary Robinson and Christiana Figueres, former head of the UN climate body (UNFCCC) that runs the annual COP summits.

It called for the process to be streamlined and for countries to be held accountable for their promises.

Sky News analysis has found only “marginal” progress has been made since the “historic” pledge from COP28 last year to transition away from fossil fuels.

COP29 Analysis:
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The letter also called for “strict eligibility criteria” for host countries to exclude those “who do not support the phase out/transition away from fossil energy”.

This year’s host country, petrostate Azerbaijan, has been engulfed in controversy.

Its authoritarian president Ilham Aliyev used his opening address to criticise western hypocrisy and praise oil and gas as a “gift” from God. His criticism of France, with whom relations have long been tense, drove the French minister to cancel a trip to the summit.

While the government and its COP team run separate operations, host countries are supposed to smooth over disagreements and find consensus between the almost 200 countries gathered.

COP presidencies are also nominating themselves to be climate leaders and throwing their own countries under the spotlight.

Azerbaijan is a small developing country that relies significantly on oil and gas revenues. But it has made slow progress on building out clean power – getting just 1.5% of its energy from clean sources – and led a harsh crackdown on critics in the run up to the COP.

In an interview with Sky News on Sunday, its lead negotiator Yalchin Rafiyev was unable to say whether Azerbaijan preferred to extract all its oil and gas or seek another, cleaner economic pathway – hard though that would be.

In a news conference yesterday, Mr Rafiyev said the president had been “quite clear” and he would not comment further.

“We have opened our doors to everybody,” he added.

Some diplomats here have hinted that Azerbaijan’s presidency team mean well but might be a little out of their depth. They have never been out in front at previous COPs, but they also only had a year to prepare for their turn hosting the mighty summit.

“My sense of this is that they’re a little underprepared, a little overwhelmed and a little bit short,” said one, speaking anonymously, as is customary for diplomats trying to maintain good relations.

“But I’m not sure that that’s politics. It might just be bandwidth and preparation and things like that.”

Different regions in the world take turns to host a COP. This year it was up to Eastern Europe, but the selection process took longer than usual due to tensions over Russia’s war in Ukraine and between Azerbaijan and rival Armenia.

Achim Steiner of the UN Development Programme, called it “troubling” that some countries face questions over their host roles.

“Are there countries that are by definition good hosts and others are bad hosts?” he asked.

“In the United Nations, we maintain the principle of every nation, first of all, should have a right to be heard.

“Labels are not always the fairest way of describing a nation. Some of the largest oil producers have hosted this COP in the past, and seemingly this seemed to be a perfectly acceptable phenomenon.”

COP stands for “conference of the parties” and refers to countries (“parties”) who have signed the underlying climate treaty.

Azerbaijan’s COP29 team and the UN’s climate body have been contacted with a request to comment.

World

Body pulled from mine after police cut off supplies to ‘smoke out’ thousands of illegal miners

Published

24 hours ago

November 14, 2024

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Body pulled from mine after police cut off supplies to 'smoke out' thousands of illegal miners

A body has been recovered from a South African mine after police cut off basic supplies in an effort to force around 4,000 illegal miners to resurface.

The body has emerged from the closed gold mine in the northwest town of Stilfontein a day after South Africa’s government said it would not help the illegal miners.

Around 20 people have surfaced from the mineshaft this week as police wait nearby to arrest all those appearing from underground.

It comes a day after a cabinet minister said the government was trying to “smoke them [the miners] out”.

The move is part of the police’s “Close the Hole” operation, whereby officers cut off supplies of food, water and other basic necessities to get those who have entered illegally to come out.

Local reports suggest the supply routes were cut off at the mine around two months ago, with relatives of the miners seen in the area as the stand-off continues.

A decomposed body was brought up on Thursday, with pathologists on the scene, police spokesperson Athlenda Mathe said.

It comes after South African cabinet minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni told reporters on Wednesday that the government would not send any help to the illegal miners, known in the country as zama zamas, because they are involved in a criminal act.

“We are not sending help to criminals. We are going to smoke them out. They will come out. Criminals are not to be helped; criminals are to be prosecuted. We didn’t send them there,” Ms Ntshavheni said.

Senior police and defence officials are expected to visit the area on Friday to “reinforce the government’s commitment to bringing this operation to a safe and lawful conclusion”, according to a media advisory from the police.

In the last few weeks, over 1,000 miners have surfaced at various mines in South Africa’s North West province, where police have cut off supplies.

Many of the miners were reported to be weak, hungry and sickly after going for weeks without basic supplies.

Illegal mining remains common in South Africa’s old gold-mining areas, with miners going into closed shafts to dig for any possible remaining deposits.

The illegal miners are often from neighbouring countries, and police say the illegal operations involve larger syndicates that employ the miners.

Their presence in closed mines has also created problems with nearby communities, which complain that the illegal miners commit crimes ranging from robberies to rape.

Illegal mining groups are known to be heavily armed and disputes between rival groups sometimes result in fatal confrontations.