Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate Deputy Howlin on introducing this legislation in the Dáil. I thank the parties that have accepted that the legislation should be able to proceed. This legislation is important for women, particularly younger women, who might potentially have a crisis pregnancy and seek the advice of rogue or fake crisis pregnancy agencies. This modest proposal is being made by the Labour Party to remove an abuse of pregnant and vulnerable women who may be used and abused by bogus crisis pregnancy agencies. I refer to agencies that seek to give bad and, in some cases, downright dangerous advice to women who come to them genuinely to seek a range of advice about the dilemmas they are facing in the context of their pregnancies. I want to make it clear that the Bill is not about imposing a particular ethos for assisting women in crisis pregnancy situations.

There are many legitimate crisis pregnancy agencies funded by the HSE that meet strict criteria. On the one hand, there are agencies such as the Irish Family Planning Association, which I want to specifically thank for the assistance it has given in drafting this legislation, and the Well Woman Centre. On the other, there are legitimate agencies such as CURA that are up-front about their particular religious and Catholic ethos. The Bill is in no way a threat to these legitimate services.

What the Bill seeks to tackle are rogue agencies, those disingenuous services that do great harm. Research has shown that women who attend unregulated counselling services are often put off seeking assistance from a legitimate provider after what is the horror of their experience. Many of these unlicensed agencies are linked to a nationwide network. We know this from some of the people who have gone to find out about the services. For example, I know of one case where a person was seeking advice from a Donegal-based address and almost immediately the person was told that someone could meet them in a carpark in one of the Donegal towns, not in a proper office. The people in the service were so anxious to meet that person that they were available at the drop of a hat. We know some of the things that have been said from the work of a number of people, including journalists who have examined this issue.

Vulnerable woman at times suffer a terrifying experience. They are told they will be very ill in later life and are candidates for cancer, or that they will never have another baby, or, if they do have a baby, that they are at risk of abusing that baby. All of the data shows that those who end up in the hands of what is basically a rogue advice centre very often go out the door and do not go back to anybody else for advice. In a situation where they are already trying to make a very difficult decision as to how they address a crisis pregnancy, they are essentially brought into a situation and given what, for many, can be terrifying advice. We are all familiar with the concept of old wives' tales but these are tales which are specially tailored to strike fear into their hearts and, in many cases, they make people forever after very vulnerable in the context of a difficult phase in their life.

While the Minister is present, I want to make reference to the Crisis Pregnancy Agency, which was founded more than a decade ago, in Fianna Fáil's time. The Crisis Pregnancy Agency was chaired very effectively by Olive Braiden and did a huge amount of work to publicise the concept, through the HSE, that advice was available from a variety of advice providers to allow people to address the situation in the context of their own ethos, beliefs and circumstances. That agency was very effective. It has since been absorbed into the HSE, within which it is a unit or office, but I believe it had better visibility when it had an independent chair. It sent out a message to all of the different organisations involved, given there is a network of advisory agencies throughout the country which provide a range of advice on different options. When getting advice, most people want to look at the options and it is important they are able to do that. The Crisis Pregnancy Agency started the first campaign to tell women to stop being manipulated if they end up, as it were, in the clutches of one of these rogue agencies. In fact, at the time many women in the Dáil, from all the different parties and from none, got involved in getting the information in regard to their own areas and being able, if necessary, to pass on that information and make it available. It is one of the aspects the Minister might examine because the Crisis Pregnancy Agency also reached out to many women's organisations, aside from the professional counsellors.

The Labour Party Bill seeks to protect the title of "crisis pregnancy counsellor" and to make it an offence to falsely pose as a crisis pregnancy counsellor. Given the regulation of the medical profession, we are all now used to reading distressing cases from time to time where people end up acting as doctors or nurses and it turns out they are bogus. Given some of the information that has been made public, which I am sure the Minister has pored over in his time, it is hair-raising to know an adult or a child could end up in the hands of somebody who is not qualified to practice. People go to a counsellor because they feel they need to talk about a situation and they need advice. It is very likely the purpose of the visit is to help them to reach a decision. If that advice is given in bad faith, against all professional norms, it can do huge, long-lasting damage that results in a person's subsequent capacity in regard to relationships, whether with adults or subsequently with children, being damaged, or in a person feeling some kind of guilt. When one talks to people who have been through this, it is clear the experience is very negative. If the person giving that advice was also posing as a doctor, a nurse or even a teacher, we would all understandably be extremely upset and we would not want the risk of harm that such people pose.

It is no longer tenable to stand over a situation where dieticians, opticians, doctors, nurses and so on are regulated but those who counsel women in vulnerable situations face no such requirement. The agencies that are properly regulated and accountable to the HSE practice to a particular professional standard. It is not good enough for us to continue to stand over a position where women are being lied to in a grotesque fashion at a time of exceptional vulnerability. Women in crisis pregnancy situations are being told new wives' tales about what may happen to them in terms of the risk of diseases, in particular the risk of cancer, or that women who have abortions will later come to neglect and abuse their children. These are lies told to scare, to humiliate and to denigrate women.

The Bill applies to the newer health and social care professions outside the traditional core sectors of medicine and nursing, and I recommend it to the House.

There are people here with a wide range of views but really bad advice is very damaging. Those on particular sides of the argument about the eighth amendment may feel that they should automatically take one side or the other. Somebody looking for advice probably has several options in mind and the critical point is that said advice should allow that person make a decision she wishes to adopt. That is the purpose of the advice; it is not for the adviser to be a warrior in a campaign to make a woman act in a particular way.

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