Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Gabhaim buíochas leis an gCeann Comhairle agus leis an Aire. Tá sé thar am athghairm a dhéanamh ar an ochtú leasú. Tá sé in am dúinn muinín a bheith againn i mná na hÉireann. Tá sé in am dúinn san Oireachtas seo ár bpost agus ár n-obair a dhéanamh.

I warmly welcome the publication of this Bill. It is only appropriate at the outset to acknowledge and commend the work of our Oireachtas colleagues on the all-party committee, under the stewardship of Senator Catherine Noone. I acknowledge my party colleagues, Deputies Louise O'Reilly and Jonathan O'Brien and Senator Paul Gavan, for their tremendous efforts.

The repeal of the eighth amendment is an absolute necessity to ensure that women have access to proper and appropriate health care. The truth is that the eighth amendment should never have been placed in our Constitution in the first place. It was a mistake and bitter experience over decades has amply demonstrated this. It is time to own up to that mistake and to correct it. It was - let it be said - born out of an entirely sexist view of the world and the conservative social values that dominated our society for decades. The power and influence of the church and its strict reactionary doctrine were central to that system. It was the dogma that produced the now infamous Magdalen laundries and mother and baby homes, when women were incarcerated against their will behind high walls and wrought iron gates for the supposed offence of becoming pregnant outside of wedlock, forced into slave labour under the shadow of the cross. Their children were taken away from them, they were told they were a source of shame, that they were sinners and were not fit to live amongst the general population. This was the cost of a social system in which the primary function of woman was to bear children and to do so at any cost.

The insertion of the eighth amendment into our Constitution in 1983 was an extension of that system. That Ireland is gone and good riddance, and the eighth amendment, too, must go. It is essential to recall the real cost of the eighth amendment to real women and girls. In the 1992 X case, a suicidal girl of 14, the child victim of rape, was prevented by the High Court from travelling abroad to obtain an abortion. The eighth amendment has caused countless women and families with the trauma of a diagnosis of fatal foetal abnormality to be forced to make a harrowing journey abroad. It has created an alphabet roll call of women's misery, women who in many cases sought and could only find relief in international courts and tribunals to recognise their suffering and the cruelty of our State. It cost the life of Savita Halappanavar, a 31 year old who, while miscarrying, was denied the abortion that would have saved her life. In 2015, a pregnant woman was kept on life support for 24 long days after she was declared medically brain dead, because a foetal heartbeat was detected in her womb. When her family asked that life support be removed, their request was denied because of the eighth amendment. This was in spite of the fact that the foetus had no chance of survival. It took an appeal by the woman's family to the High Court for her life support to be switched off. Even in death, the eighth amendment could rob a woman of her dignity.

Some people will say that these are the hard cases, the outliers and exceptions. They will argue that hard cases make bad law. I say that these cases are the hardest, most cruel face of the eighth amendment. I say that our bad law made these hard cases. I say that these women and these cases are, in the very first instance, the reason to repeal the eighth amendment. We as a society must demand and ensure that there are no more hard cases, no more Savitas, no more traumatised women known to us in the public domain as letters of the alphabet. That is our first duty. We must assert clearly that the State will not force a rape victim to carry a pregnancy to term. We must demand that women and families faced with the devastating diagnosis of fatal foetal abnormality are no longer denied care, comfort and choice here in their home country. We must assert that doctors must be free to do their job and must be able to make medical decisions in the interests of women without a threat of criminal sanction. We must ensure that health care choices - life and death choices - are not skewed or delayed while medics seek advice from constitutional lawyers. We must be in no doubt that the eighth amendment has had that chilling effect.

I thank the Minister, Deputy Simon Harris, for his words this morning. It is essential that he has emphasised the fact that the courts still feature. Access to and the review of the courts are still applicable to any legislation that might come through this House. I say to those who would scaremonger on this count, "Shame on you." Anyone who argues that the courts have been written out of the scenario, that this is some kind of carte blanche for untrustworthy politicians, is willfully misleading public opinion.

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