Ms Marie O'Shea:

I first thank those members of the committee who sent in written questions earlier this year. I appreciate the consideration they have given to the review. Unfortunately, because of my own work commitments, I could not come back to the committee or respond to those questions. My preference is to respond face to face because I believe if I did so on paper, it might not answer all of the issues which the members wanted to have clarified. I am delighted to have two key researchers with me here today, Dr. Deirdre Duffy and Dr. Catherine Conlon, who helped considerably in the review.

At the outset, I might reiterate that the terms of reference for me for this review were to assess the extent to which the regulations in the 2018 Act had been achieved and where they were not achieved to make recommendations. While I drew on the WHO abortion care guidance and other international mandates we have as regards a human rights approach to termination of pregnancy, it was not part of review to compare the Act and assess how it measured against those instruments, but I am happy to talk about them in the context of the review.

I thought I should clarify that at the outset.