NEW YORK BOSTON |#Popular: Irish Celebrity Gossip Irish in US Politics Irish Festivals Irish Roots Irish Entertainment Offbeat Irish

Home Page > News > Historic move as Irish government drafts abortion legislation for 2013 vote

Historic move as Irish government drafts abortion legislation for 2013 vote

Archbishops immediately object and call for a free vote in Irish parliament

ANTOINETTE KELLY,

IrishCentral Staff Writer

Published Wednesday, December 19, 2012, 7:08 AM

Updated Wednesday, December 19, 2012, 9:37 AM

Larger Text

E-mail

49 Comments

Irish women campaign for a change to abortion laws in Ireland after Savita Halappanavar's death

Photo by Google Images

In an historic move, the Irish government has agreed to introduce new legislation allowing abortions to be carried out in Ireland within the terms of the Supreme Court ruling in the X Case.

That ruling called for allowing abortion when the life of the mother was in danger and the risk can only be relieved by terminating the pregnancy.

The government will bring forward a vote in the New Year but already there is strong opposition.

The four Catholic Archbishops released a strong statement saying that they wanted a free vote on the issue without the government whip being applied and they encouraged “all to pray that our public representatives will be given the wisdom and courage to do what is right."

The archbishops stated:“public representatives must consider the profound moral questions that arise” in relation to the decision “by the Government to legislate for abortion."

While the government has a massive majority, it is believed there are up to 20 Fine Gael TDs who have mixed views on whether to vote yes. That could make the final vote very tight.
Current abortion law was enacted in 1861 and applies a blanket ban.

The government statement added: “The legislation should provide the clarity and certainty in relation to the process of deciding when a termination of pregnancy is permissible, that is where there is a real and substantial risk to the life, as opposed to the health, of the woman and this risk can only be averted by the termination of her pregnancy.”

So twenty years after the Irish Supreme Court ruling establishing a woman's right to abortion when her life is at risk, Ireland's government will now finally introduce a new law to clarify the situation.

According to CNN, the long postponed decision was made in a lengthy Irish Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, and it follows in the wake of controversy over the death of Savita Halappanavar from blood poisoning after a termination was refused to her in a County Galway hospital seven weeks ago.

The government is reportedly acting on the findings of an expert group on abortion, commissioned after a judgment by the European Court of Human Rights in 2010. It is likely to be several months before the proposed legislation is finalized, however.

Health Minister Dr. James Reilly said that he was aware of the strength of feeling around the issue of abortion in Ireland, but he reminded the public that the government has a duty to ensure the safety of pregnant women in Ireland.

The death of Halappanavar, an Indian-born dentist who had moved to Ireland, prompted outrage in Ireland and led to an international outcry.

Her husband, Praveen Halappanavar, said his wife was advised that her unborn baby would probably die. In extreme pain, she asked for an abortion but was reportedly told that Ireland is a Catholic country and that an abortion could not be provided while the fetus was still alive, a decision that was at odds with the Supreme Court's ruling on the threat to the mother's life 20 years earlier.

1 2 Next page >

Nster.com

E-mail

49 Comments

15 - 49 | See all comments

Gearoid4 | Dec 21, 2012, 03:18 PM EST

I really do not see how for example a fetus found with the chromosome responsible for Downs Syndrome poses any threat to the life of a mother. Rather it is the poorly-informed choices of many which leads to the high abortion rate of such fetuses which has an nasty undertone of eugenics about it. It has been conclusively shown that children with this genetic condition often bring much happiness and love into their families and often develop into well-rounded adults who contribute a lot to their communities. They have a right to live as much as anyone else. The recent Paralympic Games held in London this year, showed people with physical disabilities competing in various sporting activities with high levels of skill. Those competitors born with genetic disabilities were thankfully spared any second thoughts by their mothers on their God-given right to be born and should give those who advocate the targeting and destruction of fetuses carrying suspect genes, food for thought.

Report abuse

Gearoid4 | Dec 21, 2012, 07:58 AM EST

eiriamach, as always, I am impressed with the logic and soundness of your arguments. More important, I am impressed with the moral power of your reasoning, and your simple human decency. Brava!

Report abuse

esatdigiwank | Dec 21, 2012, 05:02 AM EST

Nobody addresses pregnancy through incest here. Our radio, tv interviewers don't challenge the men in frocks re. this when confronting them on air. This is to demonstrate that the arena for an open, honest debate does not exist in Ireland. Why must a girl who conceived due to a sexual assault/rape by an alcoholic predatory male blood-relative be compelled to bring the pregnancy to full term? I'm incredulous.

Report abuse

WoundedKnee | Dec 21, 2012, 02:07 AM EST

Just saw on CNN a factoid: In India 50.000 mothers die in child birth every year. That is to say that between probably 100 and 150 pregnant women died in India on the day that Ms Halapeno died. And the day after. And the day after that... And India (and the pro-abortion lobby in Ireland) got all sanctimonious and preachy about the death of one woman in Ireland? Didn't even wait for an investigation into the circumstances before rushing out with their self-righteous nonsense.

Report abuse

eiriamach | Dec 21, 2012, 01:26 AM EST

Gearoid asks, "Who are we to sit in the place of God and determine who lives and dies in this fashion?" Every time a surgeon removes a cancerous tumor or replaces a heart valve after a patient's cardiac failure or performs a needed kidney transplant, every time a family removes a brain-dead accident victim from machines that maintain blood circulation and air exchange, every time parents opt to have a stent inserted to drain killing fluid from the brain of a newborn, WE "determine who lives and dies in this fashion." WE have responsibility to preserve human life, but not in disregard of whether it IS human life or merely the preservation of a body from decay, with no human functions whatever. You would not deny life-saving surgery to the cancer victim, the heart-attack victim, the kidney-failure victim, or the hydrocephalic infant, no. Only women in crisis pregnancies would you leave at the mercy of nature, denying them a life-saving medical procedure-- on the transparent excuse that a non-viable 3-month foetus has an "equal right to life." Only to WOMEN who decide to bring new life into the world would YOU "sit in the place of God" and deny their own right to life when pregnancy becomes life-threatening crisis. What kind of God teaches YOU such tyranny?

Report abuse

Gearoid4 | Dec 20, 2012, 05:05 PM EST

I agree that you did not mean to say that "profoundly handicapped infants" should be subject to any form of "mercy" killing and do sincerely apologize for that. But my main points still stand concerning the immorality of using pre-natal screening to weed out fetuses who possess certain defective genes or chromosomes which may result in medical difficulties for them later on. This should not result in a death sentence being imposed on them, as they have every right to live as anyone else.

Report abuse

Gearoid4 | Dec 20, 2012, 04:51 PM EST

By the way, a fetus(not a child in your eyes) is fully human and cannot be classified as anything else. He or she has a heart-beat at 3 weeks and brain waves start to form, although the brain stem is at a early stage. Of course the stipulation of the Irish Constitution in favor of equal protection of the mother and child is viable and is a sane civilized provision in a world where pro-abortion propaganda is increasingly making the womb a very dangerous place for nascent life. Ireland has the necessary medical expertise to protect mother and child and do not the evil of abortion legislation to guarantee it.

Report abuse

Gearoid4 | Dec 20, 2012, 04:44 PM EST

Well, I re-read your original posting, Eiriamach and you do talk about " profoundly handicapped infants" and "first trimester fetuses". You think that it is fine to use medical scanning technology to detect medical defects in first trimester fetuses that may cause them serious problems later on in later childhood. You think that this is merciful in preempting and thus stopping unnecessary suffering later on. But this approach can be seen in the terrible outcomes of fetuses born with the defective chromosome which causes Down Syndrome, as at least 50%(other figures state 90%) of them are aborted annually in the US . Who are we to sit in the place of God and determine who lives and dies in this fashion?

Report abuse

eiriamach | Dec 20, 2012, 02:14 PM EST

No, Gearoid, I do NOT "talk about 'profoundly handicapped' children." I wrote about a three month or earlier FOETUS--which is by no stretch of a sane imagination a child--a foetus that will never be able to assimilate food or have any other human functions but is fated by irremediable congenital conditions to starve slowly to death after birth. It is stark cruelty to allow such suffering when the means to prevent it is in our hands. I did not write about "mercy." I wrote about PREVENTING SUFFERING--both of a newborn and of parents and health workers and anyone who knows of such tragic births. So there is NO WAY that I have advocated what you call "mercy killing" or euthanasia or eugenics! I advocate responsible child-bearing and parenting. Unless you are truly stupid, your distortion of what I wrote is unconscionable -- but typical of those who will not deal with life's harsher realities and prefer to demonize those who do face them. Your insistence that the Irish Constitution can give "equal" protection to the life of a non-viable foetus and the life of a pregnant woman struggling in incomplete miscarriage is not just untenable in the face of plain logic, but a telling retreat from the realities of pregnancy and childbirth. Such occurrences as I've described may be rare, but human beings must deal with them--humanely--applying consistent moral principle rather than romantic fantasies of denial and evasion! BTW: Your "trawl" of confidential medical records ought to put you in prison.

Report abuse

bobby | Dec 20, 2012, 12:23 PM EST

So does your Brain butlerreport.....

Report abuse

butlerreport | Dec 20, 2012, 12:15 PM EST

Ireland lives in the stone age.

Report abuse

lawyer4 | Dec 20, 2012, 10:17 AM EST

The European Court of Justice has binding jurisdiction over EU Member States, and the European Court of Human Rights has binding jurisdiction over signatories of the European Convention on Human Rights. Ireland is both.

Report abuse

lawyer4 | Dec 20, 2012, 09:26 AM EST

seatonshannon, you are either a fool or a fraud. First of all, your come-on has nothing to do with the issue under discussion. It's a cheap trick to con the dim-witted. What you describe is one of the most common scams on the internet, well documented over several years. The only folks who make money are the ones owning these websites - to whom dunces must sent money in order to obtain the secret to this bonanza - but you get no secret formula and there is no bonanza. I trust Irish Central readers will not be taken by this transparent scam.

Report abuse

seatonshannon | Dec 20, 2012, 04:12 AM EST

If you think Stephen`s story is incredible,, in the last-month my sister's best friend basically recieved a check for $7703 putting in a fourty hour month in their apartment and they're roomate's half-sister`s neighbour has been doing this for four months and got over $7703 part time from their laptop. follow the tips from this address, wow92.com

Report abuse

WoundedKnee | Dec 20, 2012, 02:38 AM EST

MichaelMcGrath--You are right to draw attention to the rush to this legislation. Contrast that with Kenny and his ilk's utter failure to do anything about the exorbitant EU blackmail. They're just lapdogs when it comes to the EU bullies.

Report abuse