Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Phase 1 is collecting information and evidence on the operation of the Act. As I was saying, there are three elements to this. Element 1 is a public consultation launched today. The public consultation will provide organisations, stakeholders, advocacy groups working in the area and, indeed, all other interested parties the opportunity to inform the review of the operation of the legislation. Information on the consultation should at this point be on the Department of Health's website - apologies if it is not. It will be advertised in newspapers and through digital advertising in the coming weeks.

The second strand of phase 1 is service users - a detailed examination of the views and the experiences of women and their partners. This is arguably the most important part of the first phase. Research to inform this strand from service users is being carried out, as I was saying, by Dr. Catherine Conlon. Dr. Conlon is progressing a large qualitative study to investigate unplanned pregnancy and abortion care. The study was commissioned by the HSE sexual health and crisis pregnancy programme. Our intention is that it will generate an in-depth understanding of the experiences of women who have accessed abortion services since the commencement of the Act. Part of that, which I have discussed with Members of the Oireachtas previously in preparing the review, we all agreed is important is that the voices of women are heard and form part of this review.

The third strand of the first phase of the consultation is a tender for service provider research. Today, a request for tender to carry out the research into the views of service providers is being published on eTenders. The following are the objectives of this strand. The first is to examine the arrangements put in place to implement the Act, including, but not confined to, service provision in the community setting and service provision in the acute hospital setting. The second is to gather and analysis data from service provider stakeholders to describe their experiences and observations on the operation of the service under the Act in order to provide a comprehensive description of providing services under the Act. The third is to assess the impacts of the Act's operation on access to termination of pregnancy services in the country taking into account the level of service provision before commencement of the Act, figures on Irish women - or women in Ireland rather - accessing termination in this country and in other jurisdictions, service provision in Ireland in comparison with service provision in other countries in Europe and beyond, and any other factors that are relevant.

The fourth objective is to identify difficulties in providing services associated with provision in the Act that have expressed by stakeholders and, critically, to highlight possible solutions to address any such difficulty, for example, approaches taken in other countries as appropriate. The next objective is to assess from the service provision perspective the extent to which the Act's objectives have not been achieved and to make recommendations to address barriers. This, for example, would go to precisely the points Deputy Durkan has just raised. The final objective is to explore and weigh the evidence for and against any proposed change to the Act from the service provider's perspective, to provide conclusions based on the research findings and to draft suggestions and appropriate follow-up measures. This is the first phase.

The second phase is the appointment of the independent chair who will assess the extent to which the objectives of the Act have been achieved. The chair will analyse in this regard the findings of the three strands of information and the operation of the Act from phase 1, which I have just covered. As well as this, the chair will draw on findings of other relevant peer-reviewed research and will consult further with stakeholders as necessary before providing conclusions and recommendations to me next year.

The chair will be appointed following a procurement process. I have asked the officials to ensure a tender is issued in the next two weeks. It had been my intent to appoint a chair directly but I was informed a procurement process is necessary for the work. This is unfortunate as we had identified a number of excellent candidates and I would much rather be announcing a chair today.

There will be some overlap with the terms of reference from phase 1 and the terms of reference for the chair, as the committee would expect. I will read through them. The terms of reference for the independent chair are to: assess the extent to which the objectives of the Act have been achieved, analysing in this regard the findings and outcomes of the three strands of information from phase 1; assess the extent to which the Act's objectives have not been achieved and to make recommendations to address the barriers if any are uncovered; assess the impact of the Act's operation on access to termination services in the country, taking into account the level of service provision before commencement of the Act, figures on women in Ireland accessing terminations in Ireland and other jurisdictions, and any other factors that may be relevant; examine the arrangements put in place to implement the Act including but not confined to service provision in the community setting and service provision in the acute hospital setting; and provide a final review report with recommendations as appropriate.

I can also go into the methodology if it would be useful to members.