Leading psychologist, Dr Maureen Gaffney, came out yesterday in support of a Yes vote in the upcoming marriage referendum, saying she was “troubled” by the conduct of the No side.

Gaffney spoke of the No campaign’s continual references to surrogacy, saying that she found it “really egregious that the problems of surrogacy are being loaded on to gay, lesbian and bisexual people as if they haven’t enough to deal with.”

“I’ve been deeply troubled by the way the campaign has been run by some elements on the No side and that’s why I’ve decided to support – I was going to vote Yes anyway – but to actively support the campaign because I can only describe what has happened as a kind of guilt by association campaign,” Gaffney said at a Yes Equality press conference yesterday.

“I can say without hesitation that there is not one study in literature that shows any difference in the emotional, education and social development of children who are reared by gay and lesbian couples.”

“The things that matter to children are emotional security, someone at your back. Gender has no bearing on how well or how badly you do that.”

Barnardo’s chief executive Fergus Finlay, also present at the press conference, hit out at “cynical and dishonest” to frighten the electorate.

“If people want to tell distorted versions of the truth about this, it has to be challenged. They’ve been given a pretty easy ride for some of that in a lot of the media. We have tried to debate this in terms of values and honesty and issues.

“We have to start naming some of these tactics for what they are. It is the politics of fear; there’s far too much of it going on,” he said.