Updated 2.31pm
EDDIE HOBBS, THE financial advisor involved in Lucinda Creighton’s new political party, has backtracked on his earlier suggestion that the former Fine Gael minister’s views on abortion have “mellowed”.
In an interview with TheJournal.ie on Tuesday, Hobbs said that from brief conversations he’s had with Creighton about the issue he believed her views “are being modified” and he suspected “her views have mellowed”.
Repeated attempts to contact Creighton this week were unsuccessful. She did not return several calls and texts about Hobbs’s comments and whether they reflected her current views on abortion.
However, late on Friday she said in a text that Hobbs had claimed to her that his comments to us had been “misconstrued”.
Here’s exactly what Hobbs told us on Tuesday:
Hobbs has now contacted TheJournal.ie this afternoon to say that he “fumbled” in differentiating between Creighton’s views on abortion and on same-sex marriage, which she has recently stated she is in favour of.
“For the absence of doubt her views on abortion are unchanged,” Hobbs said this afternoon.
He added: “The truth is I’ve never spoken to her on either issue as we have no whip on social conscience matters.”
Creighton’s was Fine Gael’s most high-profile departure after the party pushed through the Protection of Life during Pregnancy Bill in July 2013.
The bill legislated for the Supreme Court verdict in the X Case which allows for abortions in cases where there is a risk to the life of the mother, including risk of suicide.
Creighton and three other Fine Gael TDs voted against the legislation, believing that supporting it was effectively paving the way for abortion on demand and was breaking a pre-election pledge by Fine Gael not to legislate for the X Case.
In her Dáil speech opposing the legislation, Creighton explained how she had been pro-choice in her student days but her views had evolved in the years that followed.
She told the Dáil 1 July 2013: “My views have evolved over the years; as I learned more about the topic, as I came in contact with friends and family affected by abortion, and as I matured and developed my own independent analysis of this most sensitive topic.”
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