Current coalition will not address foetal abnormalities

Allowing abortions in cases where a baby has no chance of survival outside the womb will not be dealt with in the lifetime of this Government.

Senior Labour Party figures have said they hope the issue of fatal foetal abnormalities will be dealt with in the future, but played down the possibility of it happening during this Coalition’s term.

An amendment tabled by a group of Independent TDs to the Protection of Life during Pregnancy Bill that would allow abortions in such circumstances was defeated in the Dáil with 19 TDs in favour and 12 against.

Junior health minister Kathleen Lynch said the Government should “start to look seriously” at abortion in cases of fatal abnormalities or where the pregnant woman is a victim of rape.

Speaking from the US last night, the Tánaiste, Eamon Gilmore, said it was “something that will have to be looked at in the future”, but that “right now our focus is on getting this piece of legislation through the Oireachtas”.

Asked if this would happen in the lifetime of this Government, which is expected to run until 2016, he said: “What we committed to in the lifetime of this Government was to legislate for the X case, to legislate within the constitutional framework.”

Mr Gilmore and Labour’s deputy leader, Joan Burton, as well as Justice Minister Alan Shatter have all said the legislation should go further to include fatal foetal abnormalities.

James Reilly, the health minister, yesterday told the Dáil that he could not accept the amendment because “as legislators, we need to have greater certainty when we pass legislation that we know will be challenged in the courts”.

He disputed figures from Independent TDs that around 1,500 cases of fatal foetal abnormalities are diagnosed in Ireland every year and 80% of these women travel abroad for a termination.

” I am a little perplexed and my chief medical officer is also having difficulty with it. I do not understand from where these figures of 1,400 to 1,600 cases per year come,” he said.

“We know that in somewhere between 2% and 3% of births there are anomalies, but only a very small number would be fatal foetal anomalies. If it is 2%, it is 1,400 and if it is 3%, it is 2,100, of which a very small percentage are fatal.”

Labour TD for Clare Michael McNamara voted against the Government in the amendment but was spared expulsion when the party explained it was a “mistake”.

He later said he did not have time to think through the “exact legislative effect” of the vote, and he should not have been in the position of casting a vote in the early hours of the morning.

“As soon as I had time to think it through, I realised that I had indeed voted in error,” he told Clare FM Radio.

“Did I think all that through at five to five in the morning? No I didn’t. Do I think we should be legislating at five to five in the morning? No, I don’t,” he said.

Mr Gilmore said: “He simply pressed the wrong button. It happens. There is no doubt about where he stands on the legislation — he supports us.”