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Ulster abortion move condemned



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Published Date: 23 July 2008
A MOVE to allow women in Northern Ireland the same abortion rights as those in Britain has been slammed by Ulster MPs.
Labour MP Diane Abbott has tabled an amendment at Westminster to allow women in the Province similar rights to those in the UK and the Republic.

Northern Ireland was excluded from the 1967 Abortion Act, making it illegal in the Province.

Because Ms Abbott proposed the amendment on the last day of Parliament before a summer recess so is unlikely to be debated by MPs, if at all, until the autumn at the earliest.

The amendment to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill is facing severe criticism from all of the Northern Ireland parties at Westminster who oppose such a move.

Party leaders and the four church leaders wrote to MPs earlier this year venting their opposition.

DUP MP Jeffrey Donaldson says the law is different in Northern Ireland as that is the wish of the people.

"We will be vigorously opposing any move to override the wishes of the people of Northern Ireland and the Northern Ireland Assembly," he said.

SDLP leader Mark Durkan said his party will do their utmost to oppose an extension of the Act.

Ms Abbott has been backed by fellow left-wing MPs John McDonnell and Katy Clark, plus Tories Jacqui Lait and John Bercow and Lib Dem Evan Harris.

The Labour MP believes women in Northern Ireland are being treated as "second class" citizens.

"If you want to have abortion and you're a woman in Northern Ireland, you have to travel to the UK. So every year thousands of women pay with their own money to have an abortion here," she told the BBC.

"The effect of the amendment would be to give women in Northern Ireland exactly the same rights to abortion with NHS funding that women elsewhere in Britain have."

Northern Ireland political parties have argued abortion laws should not be changed in the Province without the consent of the Assembly.

WHAT ARE YOUR VIEWS ON THIS STORY?

SHOULD ABORTION BE LEGALISED IN NORTHERN IRELAND?

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The full article contains 356 words and appears in n/a newspaper.
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  • Last Updated: 23 July 2008 3:22 PM
  • Source: n/a
  • Location: Belfast
 
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civis,

belfast 23/07/2008 17:15:45
A caption to one of your photographs states that there is 'cross-community opposition among Northern ireland's political parties' to legalising abortion here. It should also say that among the voters for these parties, there is also cross-community support for liberalisation and respecting the right of women to exercise choice in relation to their own bodies. We can expect the usual clatter of illiberal sentiment from the reactionary church establishments, and the politicians who cow-tow to them - or, like Iris, want to promote themselves with their extremist opinions. But they should not be permitted to monopolise the debate. And if it takes British politicians to break down the barriers of discrimination and moral prejudice here - just as it was European jurists in the 1970s who were needed to remove the legal discrimination against gays - then so be it. On some issues, enlightened Westminster politicians should be supported again the local backwoods.
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CounterAtheist,

South Armagh 23/07/2008 19:26:02
"[...]among the voters for these parties, there is also cross-community support for liberalisation and respecting the right of women to exercise choice in relation to their own bodies."

I'll ignore the absurdly euphemistic language for what is essentially splitting a baby's head open (if lucky), AND that you say opposing it is tantamount to anti-homosexuality AND that it is not "their" bodies but rather their unborn child's that is destroyed.

What I would like to know, civis, is how many support the "right" to be aborted, statistically? It seems odd, that on the one thing the main parties agree there is supposedly overwhelming support for abortion among voters. Where and what are the figures, exactly?
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Kilsally,

Cookstown 23/07/2008 20:46:02
why would Northern Ireland want to chose the culture of death? the mainland now needs immigration to support an aging population because 6 million British babies have been aborted in the last 30 years, not to mention the consequences of the casual sex era that abortion and contraception in cahoots with various media and music industries have created giving rise to the mainland having the worst teenage pregnancy rate in Europe. Of the 108 Stormont MLA`s in the Assembly 107 are opposed to introducing the Abortion Act to Northern Ireland. The Labour MP might better address the issue of `equality` by seeking reform of the Labour party to allow Labour constituency associations to be formed, which they still dont allow in northern Ireland now that they have lifted their 80 year old ban on people from Northern Ireland being members of the Labour party, despite people from the Republic and the rest of the world being allowed to join rather than enacting laws contrary to the will of 99% of the population of Northern Ireland.
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