Shelly Hannigan
The abortion issue is huge in Ireland at the moment and it doesn’t look set to be forgotten any time soon with Strike4Repeal only three weeks behind us. So what’s it all about?
Article 40.3.3, or the 8th Amendment, of the Irish constitution states that “The State acknowledges the right to life of the unborn and, with due regard to the equal right to life of the mother, guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate that right.” This essentially means that the right to life of the unborn is equal to the mother’s right to life.
The amendment passes in 1983 with a 67% majority and, as you can see from the timeline, clauses have been added throughout the years to allow people the freedom to travel abroad and allow them the right to acquire information about legal abortions abroad.
The chart below shows the change in the amount of abortions procured in the UK by those who gave Irish addresses between the years of 1980 to 1990. It shows that Irish women were travelling for abortions despite harsh laws.
So has Ireland always had strict laws on reproductive health? Well, a quick look at the timeline shows that there have been strict laws surrounding reproductive health for years, look back as far as 1929 for example. The Censorship of Publications Act prohibits the selling, publishing, distributing, or importing of publications that are seen as immoral or indecent including material relating to contraception or abortion. The Censorship Board, since the 1946 Censorship of Publications Act, decide which publications violate this. The board still exists today but are no longer as severe in their decisions.
What else does the timeline show? We can see that pharmaceutical companies succeed in the introduction of the contraceptive pill in Ireland in 1963. A step forward, no doubt, but it was actually introduced as a cycle regulator and not as a contraceptive.
It is not until 1969 that Ireland sees a family planning clinic set up. The Fertility Guidance Company LTD, now the Irish Family Planning Association, sidesteps laws by providing contraception for free and accepting ‘donations’ from clients.
McGee V. Attorney General and the Revenue Commissioners finds that the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1935 violates Mrs McGee’s right to privacy in marital affairs when customs seize spermicidal jelly that she ordered from England. She had ordered this as she was advised by her doctor that she would risk her life if she became pregnant again and so sought to avoid pregnancy.
One year after the 8th Amendment is passed sees a 15-year-old school-girl give birth alone in a grotto in County Longford. The teenager and new-born are later found dead in the grotto.
The Criminal Law (Rape) (Amendment) Act of 1990 introduces new crimes of sexual assault, aggravated assault and rape under section 4. This act abolishes the ‘marital exemption’ clause. This clause meant that a husband could have sex unconsented with his wife but not be found guilty of rape.
We can see from this next graph that from 1991 to 2001 the amount of Irish getting abortions in the UK seems to increase.
The X Case in 1992 can be seen on the timeline and highlights issues with the 8th Amendment. It involves a 14-year-old girl who became pregnant after being raped. She planned to travel to the UK for an abortion and the family asked the Gardai if the DNA from the aborted foetus could be used as evidence. An injunction was granted in the High Court to prevent the girl from having the procedure but was overturned in the Supreme Court. She later miscarries before the termination is carried out.
Then in 1995 the Regulation of Information (Services Outside the State for the Termination of Pregnancies) Act allows doctors, advisory agents, and counsellors to provide information on abortions abroad to women who request it. This act ensures that information about abortion will be provided alongside information on parenting and adoption. This can only be provided in one-to-one counselling and also prohibits the provider from making a termination appointment for their client.
Miss C was raped in 1997 by a family friend who has since been jailed. The Eastern Heath Board (EHB) makes an application to the court to bring her to the UK for an abortion, which she has in December 1997. The girl’s parents, members of the travelling community were opposed to this as abortion is against their beliefs. It has since been revealed that Miss C found this ordeal traumatic and that she didn’t understand fully what was going on.
In 2000 the UN Human Rights Committee expresses concerns over Ireland’s restrictive abortion laws.
Irish voters then vote against an attempt to exclude the risk of suicide as grounds for abortion in 2002. The 25th Amendment of the Constitution (Protection of Human Life in Pregnancy) Bill is barely defeated with a 50.42% of voters voting against the proposed bill.
RTE removes the ban on condom adverts in 2005 and there seems to be a drop in the number of abortions in most years after this across all ages. This could suggest that banning the information on contraceptives, as has been the way for many years before, as shown, is not the way to go. It could suggest that by making contraceptives advertised and accessible people can become more educated thus resulting in less unwanted pregnancies and so could possibly be a reason why we see a reduction in abortions. The change in abortion rates through all ages can be seen in the graph below. Do note that this graph represents abortions procured by women who have given Irish addresses to UK clinics and does not include abortions procured in other countries.
The Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act of 2006 sets the age of consent to sex at 17 and also criminalises consensual sexual activity among those under the age of 17.
The Crisis Pregnancy Agency and the Department of Education and Science then publish a study of sex education in Ireland. The research shows that implementation of Relationship and Sexual Education (RSE) is inconsistent across Irish schools as 40% of schools do not have a formal RSE policy as of 2007.
Ireland is criticised once more by the UN Human Rights Committee for its restrictive abortion laws in 2008.
A national opinion poll commissioned by Marie Stopes in March of 2010 shows that 78% of the population want liberalisation of Ireland’s abortion laws, while support for abortion when a pregnancy seriously endangers a woman’s life is at 87%. Later that year Dail Na Nog, under the guidance of a professional researcher, find that 74% of senior cycle students (5th, 6th and Transition Years) receive no sex education in 2009.
February 2011 sees a huge step being taken in Ireland on contraception availability as the Irish Medicines Board grants over-the-counter status to the emergency contraceptive, Pillnorlevo. This essentially means that the ‘morning after’ pill can be purchased directly from pharmacies without a prescription.
The Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act is passed in 2013 allowing abortions but under very strict circumstances also involving the person meeting with a panel of experts before a decision is made. This Act came after the death of Savita Halappanavar, a 31-year-old dentist. She died at University Hospital Galway on the 28th October due to complications of a septic miscarriage at 17 weeks gestation after being denied an abortion.
The case of Ms Y raises concerns about the adequacy of the Protection of Life Act when a young migrant woman (Ms Y) sought an abortion after finding out she was pregnant. She had been raped in her home country and was suicidal, which the 2013 Act accepts as grounds for abortion, however, her baby was delivered via caesarean section. There is still controversy surrounding this case in relation to the government and whether they handled the case correctly.
In September 2016 Ireland rejects the 16 outstanding recommendations relating to abortion made during the Universal Periodic Review in May of the same year. October 15th 2016 sees the inaugural meeting of the Citizen’s Assembly, the last of which is to be held on March 4th and 5th 2017.
The Times investigation into a rogue pregnancy counselling agency in November 2016 results in a discussion in the Dail on the Health and Social Care Professionals (Amendment) Bill. This bill aims to clamp down on rogue crisis pregnancy agencies in Ireland by regulating them to ensure women are given truthful information.
This brings us back to the present day. Pro-choice and pro-life activists are voicing their opinions about the 8th Amendment of the Irish Constitution and whether it should be repealed. The pro-choice group are in favour of repealing the Amendment to allow women bodily autonomy during pregnancy while the pro-life group want to keep the Amendment in order to protect the unborn.
To conclude, the data allows us to see that Irish laws have been quite restrictive and even when laws are in place preventing abortion it does still happen. It can also be seen that when bans on information surrounding contraception are in place the rates of abortion appear to increase suggesting that perhaps education about and access to contraception is better for people than keeping it hidden.