Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am sharing time with Deputy Fitzpatrick. I am pleased to speak in support of this Bill to bring about a referendum on the eighth amendment. At the outset, I acknowledge the leadership and empathy of the Minister for Health, Deputy Harris, to bring us to this point. For more than three decades pregnant women in Ireland have recognised and lived the restrictions imposed by the eighth amendment on their reproductive lives. Thousands have left this country to access lawful abortion elsewhere. Thousands more have imported medication, abortion pills, and self-administered terminations in their own homes.

We have no way of knowing how many women have continued with pregnancies they did not want, have suffered severe health consequences from pregnancy or have harmed themselves in the attempt to bring their pregnancies to an end. As a feminist, a progressive and a lifelong activist for social justice, I am proud to be a part of the Government that now asks these Houses to ask the people is this a situation that we are willing to endure.

The proposal of a referendum on repeal of Article 40.3.3° has come about not only through the excellent work of the Citizens' Assembly and the Oireachtas Joint Committee on the Eighth Amendment but, fundamentally, through the decades of civil society activism that has highlighted the impact of the eighth amendment and through the bravery and generosity of people, including some women in this House. I greatly acknowledge their contribution in telling their stories of the eighth amendment. These stories cannot be ignored. Across the thousands of submissions to the Citizens' Assembly, people told us about the hardships they suffered to access abortion and about the desperation they experienced from pregnancies they did not want.

One of the experiences relayed in the Abortion Rights Campaign submission is of a woman who was raped by a man she considered to be her friend. When she found out she was pregnant, she decided she could not, as she put it, continue with the pregnancy that brought so much pain and destruction in her life already. She took a train to Dublin, slept overnight in the airport and took a 6.50 a.m. flight to the UK. She had to stay in a hostel and could not even experience her bleeding and loss in private. Instead, she had to try to sleep in a 16 bed dormitory because she could not afford a hotel. She was treated kindly by nurses and bus drivers. When she got on her return flight, there were three other women travelling on their own who looked exactly like she did. They never said a word to each other but they did notice each other. That woman did not access aftercare until ten months had elapsed because of the stigma she felt was attached to having had an abortion. This is not what should happen to someone who has already been the victim of a terrible disrespect for her right to decide what happens to her body. This woman should have been able to access the abortion care she needed here in Ireland. However, the eighth amendment made that impossible.

Another woman's submission relays how in 2005 her abortion saved her life. It allowed her to go on and have children later in a secure and safe environment where she could provide for her family. Another woman again, part of the "In Her Shoes" Facebook project for first person narratives, tells us she accessed abortion care because she already had two existing kids but with a myriad of issues. She had no money, a rocky relationship and felt continuously at the end of her rope already because, before the pregnancy, one of her children required a huge amount of extra care. She simply could not care for her existing family if she had another child.

Yet another woman told of how she got pregnant with her husband. He left her with five children already to take care of and refused to support those children. She accessed abortion care because she could not care for another child. She never told anyone she had an abortion. Again, another young women told "In Her Shoes" about her boyfriend, whom she trusted. He had been removing the condom during sex without her consent, a highly practice known as stealthing. She then bought abortion pills online. Her powerful words stay with me. It was not her choice to be a mum. It was not her choice to have a child with a man that did not respect her body and her boundaries. She said she was sorry over and over again and realised she was also saying sorry to herself. This was such a sad position to be in. She was alone, bleeding, keeping a secret and taken advantage of by a guy she thought was good.

I relay these stories because the question of whether to repeal the eighth amendment is not some abstract Constitutional conundrum. It is about real life. Life is difficult. Life is sometimes messy. There is no typical person who accesses abortion care. More than half have been using contraception that failed. Many already have children. Many are in stable relationships. Some are adolescent girls for whom I have a special ministerial responsibility. Some are unwell and cannot cope with the physical and emotional costs of pregnancy. Some are poor, some are rich, some are old and some are young. Some are families who long for the safe arrival of their much wanted child but are devastated by an unexpected diagnosis and decide that their parental love will not allow them to have that child suffer a painful and short life and death. All are people who made decisions about what they can and cannot bear. I refer to ethical decisions, decisions that are right for them. Now, we must let the Irish people make a decision. Do we want to force women to make these decisions in shame and in stigma in the shadows of the State? Do we want to continue to prevent doctors from caring for their patients where they agree that ending a pregnancy is the right course of action for them? Do we want to continue to rely on the kindness of strangers in another country? I refer to taxi drivers, hoteliers, nurses, pharmacists, doctors and Irish emigrants who provide warm beds and financial support to meet the needs of women who have lived in this country. Or do we want to make sure that people can make decisions for themselves in their own country and in their own home?

If we think that change - any change - is needed to make our law better and to meet the needs of pregnant people in this country, then we must vote to repeal the eighth amendment. If Members of this House believe that the decision about the future of the eighth amendment is not ours alone nor that of the electorate of 1983 but is rightfully the decision of the Irish people, then we must vote to support this Bill.

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