Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Senator Bacik raised an important point and one on which I am happy to put on record my position. It is my intention to bring forward health legislation in 2019 to legislate for safe access zones. The Government made a decision that we should do that so I have a Government decision to do it. I also have a Government decision that it would be health legislation, which is important. I have an obligation as Minister for Health to ensure the safety of women and doctors accessing and working in our health service, so I will bring that legislation forward in 2019.

It is a statement of the obvious to say that in a post eighth amendment Ireland, the power has been given to legislators to amend, bring forward and review legislation as they see fit. I respectfully suggest, as did the Senator, that we need to be careful that we are not passing this law in the belief that the matter has been settled for a generation. This is something that will require us, as legislators, to step up to our constitutional obligation to regulate these services and ensure they work and satisfy what people voted for. The Houses of the Oireachtas are now empowered to bring forward changes and legislation as they see fit. Unlike the UK, which is referenced regularly and which passed legislation that was left sitting on a shelf for many years, we built reviews and annual reports into our legislation to allow us to monitor its operation to ensure there are no unintended consequences. I am certain there is no such thing as perfect legislation. This Bill is formed on the basis of what I promised people we would do and I take that responsibility very seriously.

This was never about the normal risk to health. It was always about serious risk. That is the balance we are trying to achieve. I accept Senator Kelleher's concerns are well-founded but we have not defined "serious" in the legislation because we want to allow the clinical guidelines to do that and give doctors maximum discretion in making their clinical decisions. I would be more than happy to make my clinical experts available to Senator Kelleher or other Senators to engage on this issue before Report Stage.