Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Savita Halappanavar would most likely still be alive if she had chosen any 44 of 47 European countries. Sadly for her and all those belonging to her she chose Ireland. We have just held a referendum on the rights of children. It was passed and now we will proceed to legislate for it, rightly so.

There have been two referendums on the Supreme Court judgment of 1992 which ruled that abortion was legal in Ireland where a woman's life was at risk, including where there was a threat of suicide, but we have not yet legislated for it. Six Governments have failed to legislate despite the people having spoken on two occasions. Why is this? When I challenged the Minister for Health in the Dáil in November last year about the Government's failure to prioritise the issue, he replied that the Government has many priorities. Clearly, this is not at the top of the list. When asked about abortion in an interview with Time magazine in September the Taoiseach stated that he thought the issue was not a priority for the Government at the time.

The failure to pass the Bill, which we introduced last April, to legislate for the X case is damning. Would Savita Halappanavar be alive today if we had done so? The people expect us to legislate in their best interests. Did we fail to do so? Did a majority of Deputies here on that night last April believe it was right to vote "Yes" to legislate for something six Governments had failed to do? Instead, they decided to play politics with us, set up yet another group to examine the matter and in the process the Government become the seventh to kick the can down the road. Many people must dearly wish that vote result had been different. In recent days Ms Halappanavar's husband said that if this had happened in the United Kingdom or India the whole thing would have been over in a matter of hours. He also said that the matter was altogether in the hands of those in the hospital but that they simply let her go. How could they let a young woman go to save a baby who would die anyway? Savita Halappanavar could have had many babies. It is difficult to understand how this could happen in the 21st century.

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