Politicians need to face up to responsibilities on abortion law

IN 1992, a Fianna Fáil senator and chairman of the Pro-Life Trust, reacting angrily to the X case judgment, thundered: “It is wholly unacceptable, and a deep affront to the people of Ireland, that four judges who are preserved by the Constitution from accountability can radically alter the Constitution and place in peril the most vulnerable section of our society.”

Des Hanafin needn’t have worried. Despite the Supreme Court carefully outlining a woman’s right to an abortion, in very circumscribed circumstances, craven politicians steadfastly refused to accept the decision and instead opted to quietly bury the controversial case and ignore their responsibility to clarify the law.

Twenty years later and those on the anti-choice side of the abortion debate are still bleating about the iniquity of the X case ruling and attempting to rewrite one of the most fundamental strictures of our common law legal system — the Supreme Court is the court of final appeal for constitutional cases and losing parties must accept its verdict, no matter how much it galls them.