Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Solidarity-People Before Profit is a pro-choice party and therefore we are for removing the eighth amendment from the Constitution and support this legislation to allow the people make a decision on whether they wish to remove the eighth amendment.

Whatever about our views on this issue, it is important, certainly from my experience already canvassing, to remind people of the question they will be asked as a result of this legislation passing and a referendum taking place because many people who do not follow all the detail of what goes on in this House are not quite sure. I do not want in any sense to duck the issue of the 12 weeks and the important discussions that were had at the all-party Oireachtas committee but it is important to remind people that, in the first instance, what we are voting for is repealing the eighth amendment. I want to argue that it is absolutely critical that we do that because at every single level the eighth amendment has failed. Obviously, it has failed Irish women who, in situations of crisis or unwanted pregnancies where they have been raped or had wanted pregnancies but those pregnancies were doomed to failure because of fatal foetal abnormalities, had to make a decision to go to Britain for an abortion and had to do so under the pressure of stigma, the financial burden and hardship and all the additional stress that resulted from that. It has failed women who take abortion pills but may not get properly medically supervised or, because it is not just an abortion issue, women who were pregnant and were not given the medical treatment they needed because the doctors felt compromised by the existing legislative and constitutional position. For those tens of thousands of women, the eighth amendment has failed them. Indeed, it has failed them for many more reasons. It has failed even in terms of the claims of the supporters of the amendment because those who supported it peddled the fantasy that inserting that amendment into the Constitution would make Ireland a place free from abortion. Even on its own terms, that has simply not been the case.

Instead, 170,000 women have travelled abroad, with all the additional hardship, stress and suffering involved, to have abortions and three to five women a day are now taking abortion pills. Holding on to the eighth amendment, therefore, as those who oppose this legislation or who plan to campaign against its removal want to do, is inexplicable to me because it does not achieve what they are trying to tell people it would achieve. If it has not done so in the past, it most certainly will not in the future.

There is an onus on those making the argument against the removal of the eighth amendment to be honest with people. I heard Deputy Tóibín making reasonable points about poverty, homelessness and so on and that we need to address those issues. Of course we do, and week in, week out many of us who are campaigning for the removal of the eighth amendment campaign for precisely those things, as the Deputy does also. However, what he did not admit in his contribution is that retaining the eighth amendment means women who, for example, decide they cannot go through with a pregnancy because of fatal foetal abnormality or because they have been raped will continue to be forced out of the country for an abortion. Is that what the Deputy wants? Does he want them to continue to suffer the shame and the stigma because he is not outlining the alternative? Will he admit that what he is saying is that women should be forced to continue a pregnancy they do not want? People have to be honest here and say if that is what they are proposing because if the eighth amendment is retained, that is what they have got. Will they continue to propose that women who because of the housing and homelessness crisis could not face bringing another child into this world and choose to have an abortion should be subjected to a 14 year prison sentence if they try to procure an abortion? That is the reality of what retaining the eighth amendment means. It means we continue to have a 14 year prison sentence for somebody who takes an abortion pill or helps women procure it and continue to force tens of thousands of women out of the country under the shadow of stigma, shame, criminality and so on or that we continue to force women who have been raped to do the same. It is appalling, and those who wish to retain the eighth amendment essentially are saying that they will maintain that status quo. I do not believe that is what the majority of people want. They recognise that change has to happen.

I have some sympathy for people who say they do not trust politicians to sort out this issue but, and it is a big "but", putting the issue of women's bodies into the Constitution is an even worse prospect, as we have seen for the past 30 years. When it is decided in this House, at least ordinary people, so to speak, may be able to exercise some influence and pressure on the politicians, but controlling women's bodies and lives and futures through a constitutional amendment such as the eighth amendment has been an utter disaster for women and, I repeat, has failed to achieve even its own stated aim.

On the issue of the 12 weeks, it is very important to spell out what that means. The reason the 12 weeks is being proposed is because that is what is the case in many other jurisdictions where abortion rights of some description have been established but, critically, it simply acknowledges the reality that three to five women a day are already accessing the abortion pill in this country. If we say we should not allow women to make that choice up to 12 weeks, what we are saying is that we should continue to criminalise women who take the abortion pill. The anti-abortion movement needs to be honest about that. They believe that women who take abortion pills should be treated as criminals and if they do not believe that, they should explain to us what they are proposing, but that is what the eighth amendment continues.

Furthermore, they are suggesting that women who have gone through the terrifying trauma of being raped should have to prove they have been raped before they can get access to the pill. Is that what we are proposing? Putting any conditionality before 12 weeks would amount to women who have already been through the unspeakable trauma of rape having to convince doctors or whoever it might be that they should have the right to gain access to the pill. Surely that is utterly unacceptable.

It seems to me that what is being proposed in removing the eighth amendment is the absolute minimum requirement to come to a humane and compassionate position that stops us treating women in the appalling manner we have done and that the legislation being proposed by the Government is the absolute minimum necessary to recognise the reality of abortion in this country.

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