Paul Gavan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is good to see the Minister of State and I thank him for coming in. He will be aware we are coming up on the third anniversary of the historic vote to repeal the eighth amendment to the Constitution.I was proud to campaign alongside my party for repeal. Unfortunately, I am old enough to remember the first referendum in 1983. I campaigned against that referendum.

After the 2018 referendum, the Minister of State will be aware that the then Minister for Health, Deputy Harris, promised legislation to establish safe access zones outside hospitals. He will also be aware of the commitment given in the programme for Government to establish exclusion zones around medical facilities. However, three years on from the original promise, there is still no sign of that legislation. I wish to ask about the status of and plans for advancing the safe access zones Bill.

The Minister of State will be aware that, every week, there are gatherings outside maternity hospitals by anti-choice protestors. The previous Government promised safe access zone legislation to ensure that these protests would not take place outside those hospitals. There are people monitoring, marching, praying and watching women going in and out of maternity hospitals. Every day over Lent, there were protestors outside the maternity hospital in my home city of Limerick.

I hope the Minister of State will agree with me that women have fundamental rights to privacy and dignity, especially so when they are visiting a hospital. I want him to think about the impact of these protestors on women as they access healthcare across the State. I ask him to listen to the following quotes from women who have encountered these protestors. I am grateful to my colleagues in Together for Safety for supplying them. The first quote is:

She asked me if I had an appointment across the road. I presumed she was making small talk as she also had one so I said yes I did. She told me she and her friends were praying that no babies were murdered in the hospital that day.

A second quote is:

They were sprinkling holy water and saying prayers outside our hospital setting while there is women having miscarriages, or having stillbirths each week or carrying their babies out in white coffins.

A third quote is:

We were attending the hospital because our baby had decreased foetal movements in the third trimester. Thankfully everything was fine, but the experience was pretty terrifying none the less. We are a same sex couple and this made me feel even more self conscious. My wife was heavily pregnant and in pain, I was holding her hand as we approached the hospital, and the all male group of protesters were really intimidating.

These protests, which are happening outside many hospitals throughout the State, are attempting to intimidate and cause upset. They are invading women and pregnant people's privacy and bodily autonomy at a profoundly vulnerable and sensitive time. People should not have to access healthcare like this.

Legislation is promised. Can the Minister of State give me a timeline as to when it will be delivered? I appreciate that the working out of this legislation is complex and that there are competing constitutional rights, but the Department has had three years to do that work, so it should be ready to produce the legislation by now. There are examples of best practice legislation from, for example, a number of states in Australia and a number of provinces in Canada. There is no end of good examples. An excellent research paper has been produced on this topic.

In a previous answer to my colleague, Deputy Cullinane, last year, the Minister assured him that women and healthcare staff "should be assured that there is existing legislation in place to protect them and to protect patients." That statement was not correct. The protesters to whom I am referring are in violation of lockdown rules, but according to the Garda, not of public order rules. We need to see and pass the legislation. I look forward to a response.