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I mentioned briefly in a recent post the Free Travel Pass scheme.

The Free Travel Pass scheme is a social welfare scheme which allows the Pass holder to be accompanied by their other half, the latter travelling for free – married or unmarried. Now, the scheme was the subject of a challenge by an elderly gay couple, with the assistance of the Equality Authority, in 2003 under equality legislation, because the guidelines of the Department of Social and Family Affairs said that a partner must only be of the opposite sex. As a result of the legal challenge, the Deparment settled – guilty, were we?

A few months later, however, the Minister for Social and Family Affairs, Mary Coughlan – now our Tanaiste – enacted legislation enshrining the very discrimination that was contained in the impugned guidelines. Her Department defined the word “spouse” as meaning opposite-sex spouses only – whether married or unmarried – and applied this across several social welfare schemes: many more than just the Free Travel Pass scheme.

At the time, Coughlan defended her legalisation of discrimination by the State against homosexuals by claiming it to be just an interim measure to allow her Department to “review” social welfare and family policy. It was also convenient that the Irish government, in our equality legislation, gave itself permission to discriminate within Acts of the Oireachtas.

I called that earlier post, “Same-Sex Relationships: Are We Really Excluded from Equality?” And it seems my question has been answered during the week by Maman Poulet [link and link]: yes.

It transpires that Ireland’s rail service, Iarnród Éireann, is now actively enforcing the discriminatory legislative provisions. The company’s Barry Kenny has confirmed the practice in email correspondence to Maman Poulet, and deferred to the Department – now headed by Mary Hanafin – when it was put to him that active enforcement might just be anti-equality.

One of MP’s commenters, solicitor Simon McGarr succinctly points out that just because something is legalised, does not mean it’s legal.

Ireland, like over 40 European states, is bound by the European Convention on Human Rights, which prohibits discrimination in certain cases.

And the EU has recently adopted proposals to prohibit discrimination in the provision of goods and services.

The Irish government may have negotiated an employment equality get-out clause for institutions of a “religious ethos”, but there is no wriggling out of their obligations under European minimum standards as contained in law.

I wonder how many elderly same-sex couples use Ireland’s rail service, and I wonder if there are any legal reps out there up to an interesting challenge.

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You might also be interested in reading: Irish Rail’s Gaywatch – Confirm they are on the lookout to stop gay couples

You might also like to send emails to your local TD, and to:
info@welfare.ie
info@transport.ie
minister@welfare.ie
mary.hanafin@oireachtas.ie
noel.dempsey@oireachtas.ie
info@irishrail.ie