Submission to the United Nations Human Rights Committee for the list of issues prior to reporting in respect of Ireland for the 130th Session (October - November 2020)

The Irish Centre for Human Rights (ICHR) at the School of Law, National University of Ireland, Galway is Ireland’s principal academic human rights institute. The ICHR undertakes human rights teaching, research, publications and training, and contributes to human rights policy development nationally and internationally. The ICHR has prepared this submission for the purpose of informing the United Nations Human Rights Committee’s (the Committee) List of Issues Prior to Reporting (LOIPR) for Ireland’s fifth periodic review. This submission provides selected research and analysis from the ICHR’s staff and researcher community. It is not a comprehensive account of all relevant issues in Ireland arising under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and should be read alongside the reports of other civil society organisations. It is supplemented by our recent report to the Committee against Torture (CAT) in advance of its next LOIPR for Ireland, 1 and a report submitted by our Human Rights Law Clinic students to the Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) for its upcoming LOIPR for Ireland.2 This Report focuses on the following areas of concern: 1. Non-Ratification of the Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture 2. Direct Provision 3. Human Rights Protections in Residential Care Contexts 4. ‘Historical’ Institutional and Adoption-related Abuses 5. Traveller Housing and Institutional Racism 6. Undocumented Migrants’ Access to Basic Services to Enjoy the Right to Life in Dignity 7. Denial of Leave to Enter the State 8. Human Trafficking 9. Hate Crime Legislation 10. Domestic, Sexual and Gender-Based Violence 11. Discrimination against Persons with Disabilities 12. Business and Human Rights Recommended questions are highlighted in bold at the end of each sectionnon-peer-reviewe

Excessive Food Consumption in Irish Adults: Implications for Climatic Sustainability and Public Health

Introduction : Food consumption accounts for 20-30% of greenhouse gas emissions in the EU. Certain foods have higher emissions than others and are often the target of policy makers to reduce greenhouse gasses associated with food consumption. However, food policy should aim to address both climatic and health imbalances concurrently and hence have more significant impact. Targeting excessive food consumption as a mitigation strategy for greenhouse gas emissions may also have a concurrent impact on the global obesity epidemic Objective: To evaluate the greenhouse gas emissions (GHGE) associated with the excessive food and energy intake in Irish adults. Methods: A secondary analysis of nationally representative data from the National Adult Food & Nutrition Survey, 2011, was conducted. The demographic characteristics, food consumption patterns and diet-associated GHGEs were compared across categories of increasing levels of relative energy intake. One-way ANOVA (p<0.05) was used to determine the level of significance across quintiles of relative energy intake. Results: Different dietary patterns were evident between the categories of varying relative energy intake. A strong positive correlation (r = 0.736; p< 0.001) was evident between dietary GHGE and the EI relative to one’s requirements. In Irish diets, animal products contributed to a large proportion of total dietary GHGE but accounted for much less of overall EI. Plant-based foods were the lowest contributors to total GHGE. When constructing strategies to mitigate dietary carbon emissions, it is important to carefully consider all aspects of sustainability. The exclusion of certain food groups from the average diet may provoke health, economical and/or cultural repercussions. An adherence to the Irish dietary guidelines, including a decrease of EI, can viably attenuate dietary environmental impact Conclusions: The results offer further evidence to support the hypothesis that excessive energy consumption and the overconsumption of certain food types are detrimental to overall diet-associated carbon emissions levels, and that adhering to the current Irish dietary guidelines can potentially lower dietary related GHGE

Opinion on the application of the Irish Constitution and EU General Data Protection Regulation to the Adoption (Information and Tracing) Bill 2016 and the Government’s ‘Options for Consideration’

[No abstract available]non-peer-reviewe