Negotiations between the Government, Fine Gael and Labour on the wording of a limited children's rights amendment should conclude within a week, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has said.
Under the proposal, a restrictive amendment dealing with powers to prosecute sexual predators of minors in all circumstances would run alongside the Lisbon Treaty referendum.
Earlier this week, sources close to Mr Ahern said he had resigned himself to having to postpone the children's rights amendment and run the treaty poll on its own.
However, Minster for Justice, Brian Lenihan, and Minister of State for Children, Brendan Smith, have since been instructed to talk with Fine Gael's Alan Shatter and Labour's Brendan Howlin.
Yesterday, Mr Ahern accepted that a wide-ranging wording on children's rights would not emerge from the all-party Oireachtas committee headed by former minister Mary O'Rourke "in this calendar year", even though he had grumbled before Christmas that the committee wanted to take until April to produce findings.
Speaking in Dublin Castle, Mr Ahern said: "I think the Government's view now is that we go pre-summer, but there is one bit of business that we want to resolve. Fine Gael did ask that we should take a limited part of the children's referendum - the C case - and that if we did that with the referendum that that would be a good idea. We see some merit in examining that. We are not certain that it is a simple issue.
"So we have asked Minister Lenihan and Minister Smith to talk to Alan Shatter. I think that they have been working closely and effectively on this to see if it is possible to do this. If that is not possible - and I would like to finalise this in the next week or so - then we will go ahead with the referendum pre-summer. If it is possible, then we will see what is involved in taking the legislation because then we would have two referendum Bills before the House: the EU Bill and the children's Bill.
"It is quite clear that the comprehensive children's issue is not going to be ready in early summer or late summer," he said. "They are not going to finish the comprehensive children's issue in this calendar year." He added later that this raised an issue for all parties since they had all promised children's organisations that they would act on the issue before Easter.
Mr Shatter said the discussions with the Government were "proceeding in a very constructive way", and he was optimistic of an agreement.
Ruling out any possibility of a speedy end to the all-party child protection committee's work, Mr Shatter said it was still receiving submissions at a considerable rate and it had commissioned extensive legal research of its own.
In February 2007, the Government produced a wording that acknowledged "the natural and imprescriptible rights" of all children and restated the existing protection of children and parents in the Constitution.
If passed, it would give the Oireachtas powers to put in place laws to protect children from sexual and other forms of abuse, and allow health workers, welfare officials and others to share data to stop or prevent child abuse.
