Rónán Mullen (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Amendment No. 33 was discussed the other evening. It has to do with the dignified disposal of foetal remains.

On the other evening here, I dwelt on our tradition of respect for the dead and how important that is and always has been in the human experience. In many ways, this amendment is made necessary in the tragic situation of a law that excludes a vulnerable and invisible cohort within the human community from the protection of law in society, departing from time-honoured traditions of inclusivity and particular focus on the needs of the vulnerable.

This was one of what I termed on Committee Stage "the mercy amendments", which do not undo the indignity and the wrong and the injustice of abortion but at least guarantee that a little human creature who may or may not - depending on the circumstances - have somebody to grieve for him or her but in any event is not generally anywhere in the world, in particular, in the western world, afforded respect for his or her human dignity in death and in burial, and we talked about what happens in other countries.

We also talked about the abuses, the instrumentalisation of the human bodies for research, even if in pursuit of goals that one would want to see achieved in medicine and advances in care. The instrumentalisation of another human being, the use of a human being as a means to an end, has always been fundamentally against the best traditions in ethics. It is an unbreakable law that we should not use one another as means to an end. That is why it was particularly important, in the context of this amendment about the dignified disposal of foetal remains, that we would include prohibitions on the carrying out of any experiment or procedure not authorised by the Act on the bodily remains of a foetus or any part of the bodily remains of a foetus, and provide also that a person who would engage in the sale or trafficking of or who offers to sell a foetus or the bodily remains or any part thereof which had been the subject of a termination of pregnancy, the procedure intended to end his or her life, would be guilty of an offence.

At one level, it seems amazing that one has to even think about tacking on such amendments but it is made necessary by the brutal reality of the legislation itself.

I want to point out, for the avoidance of doubt and controversy, that this refers only to surgical abortions. I also want to point out that the provisions of this amendment do not create any responsibilities or carry any consequences for the woman involved. They carry consequences for medical personnel and institutions which would not treat the remains of aborted children in a dignified way where those children are aborted surgically.

That is the amendment. I know what will happen to it but it is important. It is one of those amendments that would attract the support of a majority of people, including many who voted "Yes" in the referendum.