Pro-life groups hit out at President Higgins’ wife Sabina for comments on abortion

Unscripted remarks by President Michael D Higgins’ wife, Sabina, on abortion have provoked outrage in the pro-life movement, which described them as “calculated and inappropriate”.

However, legal experts say there is no constitutional impediment stopping Mrs Higgins from giving her opinion on political matters.

Following a speech to midwifery students at Trinity College Dublin, Ms Higgins described as an “outrage against women” the possibility of women being made to carry a pregnancy to term when fatal foetal abnormality has been diagnosed.