Ms Mary O'Toole:

The other point the committee has to bear in mind about the case law is that the vast preponderance of the cases involve children. The case law is about children ranging in age from approximately 13 and a half years to 17 years. The young woman in X was 14 years of age. The person in the C case was a young woman in care aged 13 and a half years who was suicidal. The High Court determined that she satisfied the test in X that there was a real and substantive threat to her life as a result of her reaction to the pregnancy. She had been, as is described in the report, brutally raped and as a result, had become pregnant. She was considered to have satisfied the X test, but Mr. Justice Geoghegan, in his judgment in the High Court, said that if one is dealing with an Irish teenager who wants to travel abroad, the travel amendment did not give an independent right to travel. It was to prevent one from being injuncted from going abroad for an abortion, but effectively what he stated was that it did not allow an Irish court to sanction one going abroad for an abortion that one could not have got in Ireland.

That case was not appealed to the Supreme Court because he found on the test the young woman in question satisfied the dicta in the X case and there was no appeal by either party. That was a case which had effectively been brought by the HSE to ask the court what its rights and duties were in relation to this child.

The last case in that series is the Ms D case in which Ms D claimed that she was not suicidal. She was a young woman in care, aged 17 years, and was in circumstances where her child was suffering from a fatal foetal abnormality and had a condition that was incompatible with life. She wanted to travel to avail of an abortion. She was very clear that she was not suicidal. She was distraught at the diagnosis but she was clear she was not suicidal. Mr. Justice McKechnie in a largely extempore decision in the High Court decided that she had a right to travel, she did not have to apply to the District Court for liberty to go and there was nothing in the statutes or Constitution that prevented her from travelling. Once again, this is a case with a child in care.

Most of the case law that has arisen involves children or other women who do not have legal autonomy because they may be refugees or are in the immigration or asylum system. Those cases have not actually come before the court as cases where there is a dispute about whether or not the mother is entitled to avail of services; they have come before the court in other ways and the court has not had to make a decision on the substantive issues involved in the eighth amendment.

I do not know if that was helpful but I will answer any questions members might have.