The night before the referendums polls opened, a nephew in South Africa sent a screenshot of a television news report that Ireland was about to vote on a proposal to delete mothers’ “duties in the home” from its Constitution. “Interesting that it would say that in your Constitution in 2024,” said he, a father and exponent of understatement.

Interesting too that people nearly 9,000 miles away on another continent had a better grasp of what Ireland was purporting to do than had our own Government. After three decades of talking about removing the Constitution’s language pigeonholing women, the Government gave us not one but two referendums. They branded them the “family” and “care” referendums. In keeping with the history of this State, the word “woman” – the original raison d’être for change – proved too hard to mention. There followed a come-all-ye campaign of issues about durable relationships, throuples, polygamists, polyamory, infidelity, disability rights, so-called “disability enablers”, self-agency, immigration, farmers’ inheritance, gold-digging mistresses, transgender rights and the price of tea in China. It was about anything but what it was supposed to have been about in the first place.

Amid the head-scratching that has ensued since the massive rejection of the proposals, one question has been posed to the point of exhaustion: Where did the Government go wrong? As the brazen kids in the ‘70s liked to retort when chided for back cheek, ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer. Had voters been asked if we wished to simply........

© The Irish Times