Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I beg your pardon. Yes, we should. It is late. I will not accept the amendment, but for the right reasons. What we want to achieve will be covered in the regulations. As far as I am concerned, the rationale is laid out in the regulations and the legislation, which relates to an imperative, time-sensitive medical reason. A termination of pregnancy absolutely qualifies, unambiguously. We have ended up with the Bill as it is now because when the original Bill was drafted, we were concerned about people who needed to get into the country quickly for urgent medical care and we wanted to provide an exemption for them from hotel quarantine. That was in the original legislation. We then quickly added to it, partly through debate in this House, for people who needed to leave the country for medical reasons. Obviously, they need to come back into the country. That might be a child going to Dresden for proton therapy for cancer or a woman, as Deputy Smith said, going to the UK for a termination of pregnancy, so we put that in the regulations.

The regulations have an advantage over the legislation in that they are more adaptable. For example, when we regulated, we were able to say it applied not only to the person travelling for care but also to somebody who was caring for them. It allowed us greater flexibility in that regard. There is an additional protection here, which I think we will all welcome, relating to applying for exemptions. They can be got ahead of time if there is any doubt.

I do not want to single out termination of pregnancy, given I think it should be considered as part of mainstream healthcare. I do not want to create a list including termination of pregnancy, urgent cancer treatment or whatever it may be. As far as I am concerned, that is one of many urgent medical reasons people can travel. If we bring in mandatory hotel quarantine - we all hope we will not - I give a clear undertaking here the regulations will reflect that. As far as I am concerned, there can be no question as to whether termination of pregnancy qualifies as imperative, urgent and time sensitive, as per the legislation. I hope that speaks directly to what the Deputy wants to achieve. It is certainly what I want to achieve and what most Deputies will want to achieve.

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