Dr. Peter Boylan:

In terms of the three-day waiting period, we have stated guidelines in our submission, which is what we were invited to do. We say that the three-day waiting period "is not supported by evidence". We also made the comment that, "It makes unwarranted assumptions about women’s ability to make their own decisions" about their own healthcare. That, basically, is the position. It is a comment rather than anything else.

An influx of women from the North of Ireland was mentioned. That is not a matter for us in respect of guidelines. What we are tasked to do in the institute is to write guidelines, in consultation with other bodies that we have heard a lot about today, and also to involve ourselves in the training of practitioners who are going to be delivering the service.

Regarding the numbers in Scotland, in our submission we noted that in Scotland 75% of terminations are less than nine weeks and 91% of these are medically induced, while approximately 10% require hospital attendance because of complications possibly not requiring admission. We made no comment about actual numbers; we were talking about proportions.

I am not aware of any condition in medicine that requires a three-day or any waiting period. Waiting periods are a consequence of access and availability of beds, operating theatres, etc.