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LAST EVENING AND the early hours of this morning saw the Dáil sift through 154 amendments tabled on the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill 2013.
Eleven had been dealt with in the marathon session which straddled Wednesday evening and Thursday morning – but these contained some of the most contentious amendments relating to the suicide clause.
As we know, the Bill finally passed through the Dáil early this morning by 127 votes to 31.
These are some of the things you might like to know, if you didn’t catch all of the debate last night:
Lucinda Creighton is no longer a junior minister
The Minister for European Affairs had indicated that she had issues with the suicide clause of the Bill – and it was always likely that she would vote against it.
She did so, even before the final vote, by taking a stance against the Government on amendment 56, midway through the debate. The lone red dot on the frontbench on the bottom left of this voting chart is Creighton’s vote:
This meant that she immediately lost the Fine Gael parliamentary whip – and it would be only a matter of time before she lost her ministerial post. (She remains a TD.)
She also voted against the Bill in its entirety, in the final vote of the night.
Paschal Donohue is now a junior minister
He had been favourite to take over from Creighton should she vote against the Bill – and a statement from Taoiseach Enda Kenny at 1.55am confirmed his appointment. A change of personnel in a matter of five hours.
Here’s the Taoiseach extolling Donohue’s virtues – and also expressing regret at losing Creighton.
Rape and incest are not included in the new Bill
Some amendments proposing that they should be were rejected last night. The argument is that they never could be because it would require another referendum, with the need for a constitutional change.
This is also the argument against including terminations for medical reasons and “inevitable miscarriages”, amendments for which were tabled during Wednesday/Thursday morning’s debate and were rejected.
Joan Collins of People Before Profit Alliance told the Dáil last night thatrape and sexual abuse sufferers feel like second- or third-class citizens in Ireland when they see the low sentences handed down for sex crimes. She said:
In many cases, judges are offering compensation instead of putting these people in jail.
Read more about that debate here.
Defining a “cut-off point” for terminations is not a black and white issue
This was the first amendment of Lucinda Creighton’s to be tabled in the night – and was similar in theme to one from Róisín Shortall, for example: that many TDs wanted a gestational limit for the carrying out of abortion. Creighton said:
It’s the minimum we should be trying to offer.
Health Minister James Reilly had sent a letter to Creighton, she said, where he said the Bill still prohibited “the killing of a viable foetus” but Creighton wanted clarity on what viability meant. In the end, she dropped that particular amendment, but it did give rise to a challenging exchange between Reilly and Creighton. He said: “You cannot set a limit on a right to life (of the woman)”, adding:
We can’t tell a woman, ‘We can save your life before 24 weeks (gestation) but we can’t save it after 24 weeks.
To which Creighton replied:
Why would I want to restrict the right of life to an Irish woman? I am a woman. I am Irish.
A woman may not be able to take an advocate with her into review panel
There was some anger in the debate last night over this issue. Health Minister James Reilly rejected an amendment from Denis Naughten who wanted the term “and/” inserted into the Bill to make it official that a woman facing a three-consultant review panel to prove she was suicidal, could bring someone in with her.
Minister Reilly told Naughten that the legislation didn’t rule that possibility out and so there was no need for the amendment. Naughten, however, has since posted a long update on his Facebook page claiming that this isn’t the case and that Reilly’s answer showed that the whole Dáil debate was simply “window dressing” and not intended to encourage “real debate on the new law”.
You can read his Facebook post here.
Opposition TDs tabled 155 of the 165 amendments
To be expected, considering this was the Government’s legislation, but Róisín Shortall claimed that the Government cared “not one jot” to liaise and concede on any point.
The Bill, she claimed, was “hammered out somewhere else and there would be no changes”. This was clear from the rejection of an amendment such as that proposed by Naughten (above), she added.
Women face a jail term of up to 14 years if criminalised for abortion
Another hotly-fought amendment debate of the evening was the criminalisation of women who are deemed to have had an unlawful abortion or of people deemed to have assisted a woman to have one. Minister Reilly said that in fact this new legislation brought the sentence in line with the standard across the EU and down from a possible penal servitude life sentence currently attached to it.
It is UP to 14 years, he stressed, and said also that it would be up to the DPP to use their discretion to refer a case or not, and for the “discretion and wisdom of the courts” to sentence as appropriate to a situation.
Here were some of the responses to the rejection of an amendment seeking to decriminalise women in such instances:
Clare Daly: She said women are “exposing themselves to not being protected in terms of aftercare” because hospitals won’t ask them questions about pills they’ve taken etc due to the uncertainty about legality.
“You are maintaining a chilling effect that is not indicative of a modern society”.
Colm Keaveney: “The idea of a 14-year sentence hanging over a woman in a distressed of vulnerable situation is appalling.”
Mick Wallace: Said it “acts as a form of discrimination” and further marginalises women who are already disadvantaged like those with disabilities, mental illnesses, those experiencing violence and migrant women.
Richard Boyd Barrett: “It is shameful that you seek to criminalise women for something that is their right.”
Billy Kelleher: “I don’t think that the sanction of 14 years will deter a 14-year-old girl who is pregnant from procuring tablets over the internet. What it could deter is her from accessing medical care if there are complications.”
Lucinda Creighton: Said it was an “extremely harsh sentence for somebody who we would imagine being in a very difficult and delicate situation” and that she had proposed to “simply reduce the sentence from a draconian 14 years” to five years.
She said it was an “extremely harsh sentence for somebody who we would imagine being in a very difficult and delicate situation”. And that she had proposed to “simply reduce the sentence from a draconian 14 years” to five years.
That if two nights is a long time in politics, six months must be a lifetime
We know that several TDs lost their party whip for voting against this legislation.
Sinn Féin though took an unusual step of releasing a press statement early this morning to announce that it had found a punishment for its one renegade TD who voted against the party advice to vote ‘Tá’.
Peadar Tóibín has been suspended, as of this morning, for six months from the Sinn Féin party.
PS: The Dáil bar can stay open until 5am
Not one from this evening/morning’s procedures but a revelation of how TDs kept their mojo going until 5am on Thursday.
Do they need a special licence to stay open until 5am in the Leinster House hostelries? I guess we’ll have to find out…
For a recap on what happened on the first marathon evening of debate, read Aoife Barry’s account from yesterday here.
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I work there. This has nothing to do with Enda Kenny or the government or hospitals in the south east. It’s simply a matter of how products perform in the markets and what’s in demand. Has been happening in this type of industry for years. It’s all about competition.
Sorry to hear to Alison. Real world economics as you point out.
This has everything to do with Kenny. I was made redundant a year ago and one of the reasons was because the government changed the percentage of redundency paid that an employer could claim back so companies panicked and let staff go. They are in front of the cameras when new jobs are announced but they do nothing for those losing their jobs.
Seamus sorry to hear you were made redundant but companys dont just make people redundant to clame relief on it the business was more than likely in alot of trouble before the government decided to alter the relief
Hold on folks…these are voluntary redundancies….no one is being forced to go…..in addition, voluntary leave normally comes with large lump sum payments well in excess of a years salary depending on the length of service, and very low tax implications and people leaving still get full social welfare payments …..these schemes can allow people move on and take up other careers, retire early or go back to study…
They are not voluntary. 206 will go. No choice there. The voluntary part is that you can nominate yourself to be one of them. If they get enough that way. It’s fine. After that its LIFO
The economy is f**ked
Really? You’d think someone would have said something????
That though first crossed my mind about five years ago now!
Another blow to the South-East. The region has been worse hit by the recession than anywhere else & now more job losses. & worse still, the government is trying to downgrade the regions hospitals & force the regions people to travel to already overcrowded hospitals in Cork & Dublin. There’s a big march in Waterford City on Sunday. There’ll be a huge crowd & the government might finally get the message that enough is enough & stop these mis-guided plans to break up the SE health boards to please vested interests in Cork & Dublin.
5 years and no improvement, what do the next 5 years hold for us ordinary working class people. Scary thought.
Think your comment sums up a lot Julie.
The march is in Saturday 2pm starting at Ballybricken in waterford city – especially important for those in south tipp as Clonmel hospital will not fare well if the south east hospital network is broken up.
I think it’s Saturday TFM.
Another silent protest that will make the news for 10 seconds.its time for the people of ireland the stand up for themselves no more silent peacefull protests
I would agree Shane. We need to go a la Francais. But you have to have unions who are not protecting a Government party on order to do so.
Yes it cant involve the unions and lets do it on a week day and cause real disruption instead of doing it on a saturday and getting a permit of the cops to do it.every town and city has goverment buildings they should be picketed and if the cops want our suppourt hopefully they wont be heavy handed.
Sorry. My mistake. Saturday at 2. Ballybricken to Mall.
They don’t have anything in their heads only meeting the targets of their EU masters. Lets cut cut cut and tax tax tax so we can keep the eu happy and hold onto our extravagant salaries, feck the reality of what we are doing, who cares we still living the boom lifestyle.
We are the little people, they don’t care about us. Enda cares more about Angela then he does about you or me simple as. Democracy is dead.
I’ve said it before…but what would u do differently? I genuinely want an answer and I’m not trying to start a fight..I feel like more could be done..but what? Taxes are bad for people but they are probably necessary, as with cuts in some instances..but honestly what else would you do? Where would u get cash to run the place?
Julie there is job losses all across europe and america .. You cant blame it all on enda and co .. We wont recover untill america& eurpoe shows recovery
For starters by not spending more than you raise in taxes. Seems fairly radical………..
Now remember I do not have an advisor worth 100,000 or so of tax payers money.
Would have defaulted on PN, Michael Taft said no consequences to defaulting on it
Would not have poured so much money into clearly failing banks
Would have demanded a write down.
Would have caped salaries of civil servants 100,000
Scrapped allowances
Reduced pensions of the likes of Bertie
Means test child benefit
Scraped property tax( people are getting nothing for that money)
Taxed wealth instead if low earners.
Put in more favourable rates for our natural resources
Locked up corrupt politicians and bankers not let them walk away with massive pensions and bonuses and hire them elsewhere
I agree with SF budget I just think it is fairer and more equal. Populist is what governments and their followers like to call it but I disagree.
As I said there has to be alternatives to something that is not working we have tried 4 years of austerity where has it got us. It doesn’t work and if it continues there is a lot more hardship and the economy has not seen the worst of things yet.
Jay funny you mention job losses in the rest of Europe and America, they both are following the monetary policy of austerity clearly not working for them.
julie so your answer to the question is that enda cause the job losses because he has an advisor and has implamented austerity and is cutting the counrties finance bill by taxes ans ==d cuts .. you must not have been here in 2007 when we went bust i suppose that was endas fault aswell how dare he do that .. governments can be blamed for alot if things but the loss of 100 jobs in tipperary surley isnt one of them … “THE MAN” cant be at fault for everything julie
Jay that is rubbish we wouldn’t be in such a bad state only for the goverment paying debt we dont own.
Enda and Co are to blame in most cases.
iswhatitis please explain how they caused this? baring in mind they were not in power when we went put and they also can force people to buy good or services from companies
They turned a gambling debt into a sovereign debt Jay.
Eamon that didnt cause the recession. The recession came first
That is going to be a big loss for all them families. 5 years this mess is running and no change for the better. We are so f****d, we need business people to get the country going not schoolteachers. Where will it all end.. disaster
Agreed..unfortunately many of the “business” people of the last 10 years are now bankrupt/ turned out to be crooks
A restructuring plan. Always used in the real world unfortunately. Never in the Public Sector.
100 jobs announced this mornin 200 lost this afternoon .. Not at all wat we want
Everyday we lose on average 42 jobs
Whats your basis for that ?
Cso calculation – over last 20 months
Ouch i didnt think it would be that much …
Strange that Abbott had a large graduate recruitment drive this year given all the job cuts they announced. Some dodgy goings on. Probably hoping to get rid of people on big contracts and bring in grads for a 1/4 of the price. It’s not right and companies doing this need to be named and shamed.
They’re process is heavily dependant on front line operators and like all big manufacturing faculties they’re trying to lean up and automate that process as much as possible. The redundancies won’t effect the engineers too much as they’re looking for 188 op’s to go
In Spain, you can buy a years supply of these products for the price of a pint.
The Abbott Vascular Clonmel facility manufactures vascular products, i.e stents and catheters. These products are used in hospitals, these products are not available over the shelf, and these products are certainly not available in Spain for less than the price of a pint.
I was in the Canaries last week, and I bought a year’s supply of catheters for a fiver. We’re being screwed in this country.
Sinead, I think you’re confusing the product made in the Abbott Clonmel facility with another entirely different type of product. The catheters made in Abbott Vascular Clonmel are vascular catheters used to treat patients with artery blockages. The people in Clonmel are making a sophisticated product, which is only marketed to hospitals, and are only used by physicians. Due to this there is no such thing as having a personal years supply.
Yeah I bought 6 months supply of pacemakers in France last week for a tenner each,… Jeez⬇
That’s what Kenny would have you believe Liam..it’s all his fault..open your eyes
They may be voluntary starting off, but if they don’t get the numbers which I don’t think they will
it will soon become compulsory,I also work there and its certainly not a years pay that’s on offer
have your say