Colette Kelleher (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I wish a happy new year to the Minister of State, Deputy Finian McGrath, and to all the Members of the House.

I warmly and wholeheartedly endorse the committee's report and all the recommendations it contains. Sadly, crisis pregnancies are an everyday reality for women in Ireland. It is something we have to face up to. So far the debate in the Houses has been characterised by kindness, care and compassion. I hope this continues in the weeks and months ahead. Speaking about the deep divide that has existed between the different positions people hold dearly and sincerely on this most sensitive of matters, the late Nuala O'Faolain once insightfully wrote that there would be no abortion in any of our utopias. With that unifying thought in mind, it is important to remember that there are practical things we can, should and must do to prevent crisis pregnancies ever happening in the first place.I particularly welcome the committee report's ancillary recommendations, which call for a full and frank review of sex education, free contraception for all and improved counselling for pregnant women. It is not widely known, for example, that vasectomies cost €400, putting them beyond the reach of many families. These procedures, as well as contraception, must be free if we are to prevent crisis pregnancies. I am also glad to see that the committee has called for the decriminalisation of abortion. It is not okay that women in Ireland today who end a pregnancy that was a result of rape face a longer prison sentence than the men who rape them.

Implementing the ancillary recommendations in full will go some way to reducing the number of crisis pregnancies and the number of women seeking abortion in Ireland. However, there will always be women who require abortion services for one reason or another. I therefore welcome the recommendation by the committee that Article 40.3.3° be simply repealed in full. The Constitution was never the right place to regulate and control women's unique ability to reproduce. We should never have been pitted legally against our own bodies. Our beautiful fertility should be a cause for celebration, a blessing, not a source of fear, anxiety or even death, or a locus of intense State control, intrusion and stigma for women. We were powerfully and painfully reminded about that control, intrusion and stigma again yesterday by Joanne Hayes. I lived in Tralee during the tribunal of inquiry into the Garda's investigation of what became known as the Kerry babies case. The inquiry into the actions of the Garda became an inquiry into Joanne herself, the woman who had children outside wedlock. It was an early expression of an oppressive State in operation against women within the year the eighth amendment was made to the Constitution.

It is telling that no international human rights treaty recognises the rights of the unborn as equal to those of the mother. Furthermore, the eighth amendment does not stop Irish women having abortions. It stops Irish women having legal abortions in Ireland. This is backed up by evidence from the Guttmacher Institute, which set out that the rate of abortion in countries with highly restrictive abortion laws is roughly comparable with that in countries with more liberal frameworks; there is no evidence that laws influence the numbers of abortions or eliminate them. Between 1970 and 2016, at least 184,000 Irish women have travelled to England and Wales to access abortion in a clinic. These women are politicians, doctors, teachers, nurses, waitresses, factory workers and full-time carers. They are our mothers, sisters, daughters, friends and work colleagues. They are people we know, people we love and women we let down.

I am glad that the committee has recommended that the termination of pregnancy should be lawful where the life or health, mental or physical, of the mother is at risk and that gestational limits should be guided by the best available medical evidence. This call that no distinction should be drawn between the physical and mental health of women was echoed by 72% of the Citizens' Assembly. I am relieved to see that the committee's report is very clear on the issue of disability. As many Members will be aware, I worked for many years in the disability sector as chief executive of an organisation that provided supports to people with intellectual disabilities in Cork. Supporting people with disabilities to live life to the full is something that I care about deeply. It is a red herring and a distraction to say, as some might, that a repeal of the eighth amendment will allow abortion on the grounds of disability. The committee's report is crystal clear in this regard and states "The Committee recommends that the law should not provide for the termination of pregnancy on the ground that the unborn child has a significant foetal abnormality where such abnormality is not likely to result in death before or shortly after birth", while allowing for cases where the unborn will sadly not survive. I believe this is the right approach. We need to deal with what happens where there is foetal abnormality with the utmost care and compassion. These are tragic cases and the parents deserve our support.

I also welcome that the committee's report recommends the law be amended to allow termination of pregnancy, with no restriction as to reason, in a GP-led service up to 12 weeks. Women have abortions for lots of reasons, sometimes for more than one. Members heard during the debates on the Domestic Violence Bill of the scale of domestic abuse in Ireland. We know that thousands of women live in consistent poverty. We know too that many women are raped or abused. We know that tragically many pregnancies do not develop as planned. We know too that many women throughout the country face difficult daily lives. All of these horrific hardships provide reasons why someone might want to end a pregnancy early on. Open access up to 12 weeks allows the 17 year-old rape survivor to end the pregnancy without having to recount the horror that she endured. Open access up to 12 weeks allows that the pregnancy conceived by incest can end with care and compassion. Open access up to 12 weeks allows the woman whose foetus has a fatal abnormality to access the services she needs close to home. Had open access to abortion existed, might Ann Lovett have died alone in that cold, dark, grotto in 1984? Would Savita Halappanavar still be alive? Would the beaten-down mother of seven have gone ahead with that eighth or ninth pregnancy? Our ban on abortion has a cruel legacy. It has left some women damaged. It has left those forced to travel feeling desperate and devastated. It has left other women dead.

I pay tribute to the members of the committee who worked incredibly hard on a sensitive and difficult matter over a long number of months. I followed the proceedings very closely and saw at first hand the effort and energy the members put in. In particular, I pay tribute to Senator Noone, who was a formidable and very fair Chair. I also pay tribute to Senator Ruane from my own group. She showed her knowledge, her passion and her grit on this issue and ensured that our group was kept informed and involved throughout. There were deeply held and divided opinions on the committee and I pay tribute to the members who went into the committee room with an open mind, who were willing to listen to the arguments being presented and who were willing to change what might have been long-held beliefs. These people thought long and hard and gave consideration to the difficult journeys endured by many women and decided that as a country, we cannot allow this for the next generation. From the bottom of my heart, and on behalf of women up and down the country, I thank them.

My engagement with this issue started in 1983, aged 21, when I voted against the eighth amendment to the Constitution. At the time, a crisis pregnancy was a real possibility for me. Access to contraception in Cork was a real challenge. Being spotted coming out of the clinic on Tuckey Street with pills or condoms, if one was lucky enough to get them, was not what one wanted one's neighbours to see. I was fortunate my many scares did not result in a pregnancy. I still remember the relief when my late period arrived. With no job and few prospects, I was not economically - and certainly not psychologically - ready for motherhood. Friends and acquaintances in the same situation were not so lucky. Some took a difficult decision and faced the lonely journey to London. Some went with their boyfriends. Others travelled alone, coming home to families that did not know or would not understand. They may still not know. When I emigrated to London, my friends and I joined the Irish Women's Abortion Support Group of which my colleague, Senator Bacik, was also a member. It was a group set up to support Irish women who travelled to the UK for an abortion. We took reversed phone calls from women calling from pay phones in deepest rural Ireland. We met women at train stations. Sometimes it was their first time out of the country. We were a friendly face and a familiar accent for women in a big and strange city, making a tough choice.

At the time most people in Ireland did not realise what a crisis pregnancy meant for women. Now 56, the fear of a crisis pregnancy no longer looms large in my life. In the 35 years that have passed since the eighth amendment was approved, the situation has not improved much. Women still are not getting the support they need for the choices they make. Contraception is still not freely available. Sex education in schools is being curtailed by religious ethos. We still turn a blind eye to the estimated 4,000 women who travel for an abortion each year. We make criminals of the women who buy abortion pills online. We put their health at risk by denying them access to the medical supervision they need. We threaten doctors and others with 14 years in prison if they dare to help. Ignoring or avoiding the issue does not make crisis pregnancies go away. I would be so proud to see us finally face up to the full realities of crisis pregnancies for all our daughters. Let us give them the power, privacy and proper health care they need. This includes good sex education, free contraception and access to safe, legal abortion in Ireland.

I am encouraged that the committee's report has echoed the calls of the Citizens' Assembly and the thousands of us who marched for repeal last September. Collectively, here in this House, in radio stations and at dinner tables up and down the country, we must now have the courage to have thoughtful reflections about this public issue that is ultimately a very private matter.