Leo Varadkar suffers resounding defeat on double referendum to modernise Ireland’s constitution

Ireland looked set to reject proposals to replace constitutional references to the makeup of a family, and women’s “life within the home”, when votes are counted on Saturday, in what would be a significant defeat for the government.

Regina Doherty, a lawmaker for the Fine Gael party which rules in coalition with Fianna Fáil and the Green Party, told national broadcaster RTE that early tallies from Friday’s poll indicated the Irish people had voted “in a very large way” against the proposals in two referendums, called the family amendment and the care amendment.

Ballot boxes were opened at 9am on Saturday, with the results expected later in the day.

Leo Varadkar, Ireland’s prime minister, had pitched the votes – deliberately held on Friday to coincide with International Women’s Day – as a chance to delete some “very old-fashioned, very sexist language about women”.

The two proposals would make changes to the text of article 41 in the Irish constitution, written in 1937.

Relationships and duties

The first asked citizens to expand the definition of family from a relationship founded on marriage to also include other durable relationships, whether founded on marriage or not.

The second would replace dated language surrounding a “mother’s duties in the home” with a clause recognising care provided by family members by “reason of the bonds that exist among them”.

But campaigners argued that the proposed new wording – saying the state shall “strive” to support care provision – would enshrine care as a private responsibility and not a state one.

In effect, the proposal to spread the burden of care for relatives with disabilities from women to the entire family became a row about the willingness of the state to support carers and what the extent of that support should be.

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