The Department of Health and Children is examining the possibility of 'child proofing' the Constitution to prevent it from blocking any child protection measures.
Minister Brian Lenihan said there was a need for a 'root and branch' review of the Constitution to see what articles interfered with protection measures and see how they can be changed.
His department, along with the Department of Education, is also currently examining the possibility of an employment-related register of people who were the subject of garda investigations related to child abuse.
However, the Government has come in for criticism from child protection groups at a cross border conference near Dundalk in Co Louth today.
Paul Gilligan of the ISPCC said the Republic was way behind Northern Ireland in many areas, which means children here are more vulnerable.
He welcomed the move towards providing soft information on people and agreed that the Constitution does block child protection measures.
'Children's rights are not protected in our Constitution as it stands,' he said.
Norah Gibbons from Barnardo's said Ireland's child protection measures still lag some distance behind what is actually needed.
Ms Gibbons said that Ireland does not yet have full vetting for all those with access to children, and that EU-wide vetting procedures were needed.
The conference was called to discuss ways of improving child protection on both sides of the border.
Northern Ireland's Health Minister Paul Goggins said the departments intended to work closely together to plan ways of keeping children safe against those who might seek to harm them.
Up to 1,600 children in Northern Ireland were recorded last year on the child protection register.
These are cases where children are believed to have suffered physical, emotional or sexual abuse or neglect.
In Ireland, one report estimates that one in five children is affected by sexual abuse and that the vast majority of such crimes go unreported.
