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Citizenship referendum raises passions
A two-day debate on the proposed citizenship referendum gave rise to much unruly behaviour as opposition TDs shouted down Minister for Justice Michael McDowell, preventing him from completing his speech on the subject. Much of the argument now centres not on whether there is a problem to be resolved but on the size of the problem. This led to all sorts of statistics being bandied about. The Masters of Dublin's maternity hospitals were reluctantly drawn into the argument and they claimed that, when they spoke to Department of Justice officials, all they we
e interested in was additional resources to deal with the growing number of births to foreign mothers. Minutes of the meetings were produced and they didn't read quite like that but they didn't incl
ude
a demand for a change to the Constitution
. What was never explained was why the Masters spoke to the Department of Justice rather than the Department of Health if resources were the only issue.
A joint declaration from the Irish and British governments stated that the referendum on the citizenship rights of the children of non-nationals will not breach the Good Friday Agreement, despite what has been said by a number of Northern politicians. The Agreement recognises "the birthright of all the people of Northern Ireland to identify themselves and be accepted as Irish or British or both" and to be entitled to citizenship of either country. The legal advice to the two Governments is that recently arrived non-nationals cannot be described as "the people of Northern Ireland". <
br>
In response to accusations that, by holding the referendum on June 11 racism becomes an issue in the local and European elections, the Government insists that a high turn out is important
whe
n ch
anging the
Constitution. It was argued that very few people w
ould bother to vote if a referendum ballot were to be held at a later date. The other possibility was that it be held on the same day as the presidential election due later in the year, but the Government decided that there was then a danger that the President would be dragged into the citizenship argument.
In response to a request from Fine Gael, Mr McDowell provided details of the number of non-nationals who gave birth in Dublin's maternity hospitals last year. The top five were Nigerian (1,515), British (677), Romanian (469), Filipino (235) and Chinese (239). Aetius sez " british" means british passport holders, probably with a paki face . It is assumed that the British women are normally resident in this cou
ntry and that most of the Filipinos are among the 5,000 working in the health service.
While Fine Gael argued against the timing of the poll, the party will support the propo
sed chan
ge to th
e Constitution if
it goes ahead on June 11.
Labour, Sinn FÃԚ Ô�šÃ”š©in and
the Green Party are all opposed to the change to the Constitution although Mr McDowell claims that the change is similar to that recommended by the them Labour leader, RuairÃԚ Ô�šÃ”š Quinn, in the aftermath of the Good Friday Agreement. He, it seems, recognised the loophole being created at that stage.
Citizenship referendum raises passions
A two-day debate on the proposed citizenship referendum gave rise to much unruly behaviour as opposition TDs shouted down Minister for Justice Michael McDowell, preventing him from completing his speech on the subject. Much of the argument now centres not on whether there is a problem to be resolved but on the size of the problem. This led to all sorts of statistics being bandied about. The Masters of Dublin's maternity hospitals were reluctantly drawn into the argument and they claimed that, when they spoke to Department of Justice officials, all they we
e interested in was additional resources to deal with the growing number of births to foreign mothers. Minutes of the meetings were produced and they didn't read quite like that but they didn't incl
ude
a demand for a change to the Constitution
. What was never explained was why the Masters spoke to the Department of Justice rather than the Department of Health if resources were the only issue.
A joint declaration from the Irish and British governments stated that the referendum on the citizenship rights of the children of non-nationals will not breach the Good Friday Agreement, despite what has been said by a number of Northern politicians. The Agreement recognises "the birthright of all the people of Northern Ireland to identify themselves and be accepted as Irish or British or both" and to be entitled to citizenship of either country. The legal advice to the two Governments is that recently arrived non-nationals cannot be described as "the people of Northern Ireland". <
br>
In response to accusations that, by holding the referendum on June 11 racism becomes an issue in the local and European elections, the Government insists that a high turn out is important
whe
n ch
anging the
Constitution. It was argued that very few people w
ould bother to vote if a referendum ballot were to be held at a later date. The other possibility was that it be held on the same day as the presidential election due later in the year, but the Government decided that there was then a danger that the President would be dragged into the citizenship argument.
In response to a request from Fine Gael, Mr McDowell provided details of the number of non-nationals who gave birth in Dublin's maternity hospitals last year. The top five were Nigerian (1,515), British (677), Romanian (469), Filipino (235) and Chinese (239). Aetius sez " british" means british passport holders, probably with a paki face . It is assumed that the British women are normally resident in this cou
ntry and that most of the Filipinos are among the 5,000 working in the health service.
While Fine Gael argued against the timing of the poll, the party will support the propo
sed chan
ge to th
e Constitution if
it goes ahead on June 11.
Labour, Sinn FÃԚ Ô�šÃ”š©in and
the Green Party are all opposed to the change to the Constitution although Mr McDowell claims that the change is similar to that recommended by the them Labour leader, RuairÃԚ Ô�šÃ”š Quinn, in the aftermath of the Good Friday Agreement. He, it seems, recognised the loophole being created at that stage.