Our Prime Minister might not be too worried about what the rest of the world thinks of him, but the Irish government is more alert to the judgement of international institutions.
It would find it unbearable to be named and shamed in Europe and the United Nations. And that dread lurks in the shadows behind the possibility of radical change in the constitutional position of the child in Ireland.
The place is a paradox. In the past decade there has been great tumult in public opinion generated by the exposure of abuse, exploitation and neglect in every corner of children's services.
The crest of revelation about child abuse within the Catholic church, tolerated by its hierarchy, may yet bankrupt the church in Ireland. But the church's role as a public carer has been the source of the under-development of its welfare state. And when charity, rather than rights, is the prevailing principle, then children become en masse mere objects of adult whim.
In Ireland these contradictions are evident in its constitution. A country that prides itself as pro-life and pro-family stands accused of a horrible neglect of children's rights. In the constitution children have no legal status. They are subordinate in every way to adults.
For a decade Ireland has been waiting for a change. Two commissions of inquiry into child abuse and into the constitution have recommended fundamental reform. But it hasn't happened. So there has been an interminable lag between public awareness and political action.
But a formidable coalition of children's rights organisations has warned that the government will be named and shamed in international arenas unless the constitution is changed.
A report this week by the influential All-Party Oireachtas Committee will propose reform requiring a referendum to inscribe children as legal persons. This would put into the constitution the presumption of "the child's best interest" that already guides Britain's Children Act.
But in Britain, the clarity of that principle has been undermined by the government's abject reaction to parents' rights groups and its own authoritarianism.
The united front by all four Children's Commissioners in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland against violence against children is what we've all been waiting for. At last the Commissioners are taking on the government, a reminder that legal principles are not always enough.
Children always need champions.
