David Norris (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the fact that the Government appears to be making the first hesitant steps towards taking a humane view on the troubled subject of abortion. I deprecate the level of hypocrisy, abuse and heckling that goes on from people who are opposed to this. The real mistake was in 1983, when the theological position of one church in this country - that the fertilised egg represents a full human being - was instituted in the Constitution. My church was very strongly against this. The Constitution was not the place for that, and that is what has landed us in all this trouble. Anybody who knows anything about reproduction knows that the female body sheds fertilised eggs all the time. There is no doubt about that. Millions will vanish unknown, and these are said to be full human beings. That is the kind of logical impasse into which one drives one's self.

My colleague, Senator Mullen, talked about psychiatrists. Apparently just over 100 spoke. I understand the membership of the association is 800. They tried to make out that 90% of those replied. They wrote to 300 or 400 and approximately 100 replied. That is a small proportion, and out of 800 it is minute.