Updated: 18.15

The Minister for Social Protection Leo Varadkar is said to be examining proposals to scrap the charge for registering a stillbirth.

Under the current rules, parents must pay €20 to collect a birth certificate for a stillborn child.

However Mr Varadkar has been asked to get rid of the fee, with his party colleagues saying it is grossly insensitive.

Parents were only given the mechanism to register a still born baby in 1995, with the Sunday Times reporting 240 such certificates were registered in 2014.

Mr Varadkar has stated: "This is an issue that has been highlighted by my colleague Brendan Griffin in Kerry and now I'm now preparing to wave that charge in the first instance in relation to stillbirths, and then subsequently, although that's going to take more legislation, in the case of a neo-natal death."