The rush by some Irish politicians to pin down the date for an abortion referendum is not just an abdication of their responsibility to mothers and babies. It also threatens the independence and credibility of the Irish political system itself.
On several occasions we have been assured that abortion – the most complex and sensitive subject that can emerge in any society – will be dealt with in a reasonable and calm manner and in such a way as to acknowledge the two lives involved. Leo Varadkar, the new Taoiseach, said as much during a debate in 2014, when he accepted that the unborn child was a human life with rights and that there are two lives involved in any pregnancy.
Fast forward a few years, however, and the level of debate about how we treat the most vulnerable members of our society has quickly deteriorated.
Ireland’s health minister Simon Harris has been at pains to insist that he wants to be the minister to bring forward legislation for “this important referendum” in 2018. His words would be more appropriate if he was announcing a referendum to introduce a human right into the constitution, rather than one which would, if passed, strip unborn human beings of their rights under the law.
But leave aside for a minute the human rights considerations. Let’s look instead at how we have reached this point.
Abortion advocates are fond of claiming that their movement is built on the tenets of democracy, but nothing could be further from the truth. There’s nothing democratic about removing the right to life from a vulnerable, defenceless human being. And there’s nothing democratic about how we’ve reached this point in the Irish debate.
When Enda Kenny, the former Taoiseach, announced plans to hold a Citizens’ Assembly to deal with the abortion issue, pro-life campaigners were quick to identify it as the first step towards a referendum on repealing the Eighth Amendment (which recognises the right to life of an unborn child). As the Assembly continued, the pro-lifers’ fear that it would be a one-sided, hopelessly biased affair was proved correct.
Groups representing families in Ireland who say their children are alive because of the Eighth Amendment were not invited to address the members. Instead, a spokeswoman from the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) was given a platform at taxpayers’ expense to talk about women’s health – even though BPAS was roundly criticised by the Care Quality Commission for serious breaches involving, among other things, a number of women being transferred to hospital for urgent medical attention following abortions in its clinics. This is the same organisation that paid for images to be run in the Irish Times with the tagline “We’ll care for your women until the government does”.
Small surprise, then, that the 99 members of the Assembly have recommended that the government introduce abortion on wide-ranging grounds. On the day they voted, new issues were introduced for the first time. They were told, for instance, that babies who survive abortions would have to be given an injection of potassium chloride to end their life. They voted just minutes later – without any discussion or reflection on the inhumanity of this proposal.
This happened time and time again in the different ballots on the final day as members voted for abortion options that were each more extreme than the last.
There was never time for the members to reflect on important details, such as the fact that, at one in every five pregnancies, Britain’s abortion rate is some 300 per cent more than Ireland’s. (Advocates are fond of claiming that legalisation makes no difference to the abortion rate in the country, but pro-lifers know this is untrue.)
As a newly elected Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar should be deeply concerned about this democratic deficit. But it is Simon Harris’s gung-ho approach to a referendum which is most objectionable. As health minister, his priority at this stage should be to determine why Assembly organisers allowed members to vote in favour of abortion on mental health grounds when all the international evidence shows that abortion does not treat suicide ideation and can, in fact, have a detrimental effect on a woman’s mental health. Given the sparsity of debate on this issue, you have to wonder if the members are even aware that their recommendation in this area flies in the face of the expert peer-reviewed evidence.
We are at a crossroads in Irish society, but what’s at stake goes far beyond the pro-life/pro-abortion divide. If the government committee is allowed to consider a referendum without first addressing the serious shortfalls in the Citizens’ Assembly process, then, yes, women and their babies will be seriously let down. But along the way the committee’s promise to discuss abortion with any element of fairness will also lose credibility. And that will have an impact on everyone who hopes for equal treatment from our political system.
Cora Sherlock is a solicitor and spokeswoman for the Pro Life Campaign (prolifecampaign.ie)
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