Abortion is illegal in Ireland unless under certain circumstances...If there is a risk to the mental/physical health of the mother...now this exemption causes a grey area to exist in the law eg rape or incest or even somebody who may claim to be suicidal as a result of pregnancy.

There have been many many different attempts at wording different legislation for an abortion bill to be passed by our parliment and as a result we have had 4 referendums since 1983 on the same issue all with different wording,because each time a referendum has been passed by the electorate there has allways been a problem with the wording and somebody has constitutionally challanged it each time,and the wording has been changed and a new referendum held.

So as we stand the last referendum was held in 2002 and so far remains unchallanged but as you can see from my first paragraph a grey area still exists and eventually this too will be constitutionally challanged...so back to square one.

The reality is though in Ireland women travel to the United Kingdom and have abortions(where abortion is legal and only half an hour away on an aeroplane)and they travel in their thousands each year averaging at about 6500 for the year 2003.
So in a nutshell we wont pass laws for legal abortion in Ireland but will not stop anybody from travelling abroad to get one.
A nice Irish Catholic solution to an age old problem....we will allow you but not on our doorstep.

It appears that Ireland resides in the opposite pole

What about the platform of the 3 major parties in Ireland?
Are FF, FG or Labour officially trying to legalize abortions? I looked around their websites and I couldn't find anything which suggests they are trying to.

Or would that be political suicide?

Also what is the "slang term" for women who go to the UK for abortions?

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Originally posted by Subey It appears that Ireland resides in the opposite pole What about the platform of the 3 major parties in Ireland? Are FF, FG or Labour officially trying to legalize abortions? I looked around their websites and I couldn't find anything which suggests they are trying to. Or would that be political suicide? Also what is the "slang term" for women who go to the UK for abortions?

Yes you are correct....Basically it would be political suicide.

The three major parties in Ireland avoid this issue if at all possible,and will only deal with the issue as constitutional challanges occur,it really is a hot potatoe but it is not illegal for women to travel to the UK with the full knowledge of the authorties.The three main political parties would not even attempt to legalise abortion,as there are so many pressure groups in Ireland mainly coming from a fundementalist religious point of view and no party wants to be seen as aligned with these people.

But i think without a doubt that the electorate for the most part are happy with the current situation and i doubt that abortion will be legalised anytime soon,unless of course it was to be outlawed in the UK,and then a rethink on the current laws would have to be reviewed.
But in the UK at the moment that is unlikely,although they are currently reviewing the time limits in which abortions can occur,at the moment i think it is 20 weeks and they want to increase this to 24 weeks (i think ? ) but there is no question of it being outlawed at present.

There isnt any slang term that i can think of......

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Originally posted by zig Yes you are correct....Basically it would be political suicide. The three major parties in Ireland avoid this issue if at all possible,and will only deal with the issue as constitutional challanges occur,it really is a hot potatoe but it is not illegal for women to travel to the UK with the full knowledge of the authorties.The three main political parties would not even attempt to legalise abortion,as there are so many pressure groups in Ireland mainly coming from a fundementalist religious point of view and no party wants to be seen as aligned with these people. But i think without a doubt that the electorate for the most part are happy with the current situation and i doubt that abortion will be legalised anytime soon,unless of course it was to be outlawed in the UK,and then a rethink on the current laws would have to be reviewed. But in the UK at the moment that is unlikely,although they are currently reviewing the time limits in which abortions can occur,at the moment i think it is 20 weeks and they want to increase this to 24 weeks (i think ? ) but there is no question of it being outlawed at present. There isnt any slang term that i can think of......

Yea there was summat on the news last week about at what age a baby could be born prematurely and still survive (they think there might be new evidence to suggest this is a few weeks earlier than currently believed) but still, abortion will never be illegal in the UK cos it is a predominantely religious concern and very few people in this country are religious any more

In Denmark the debate is definately gone and over. Today the only party with abortion as one of their prime issues is too badly supported by voters to get into parliament. There would have to be a major insurge in abortion-tourists for the issue to be raised again.

Here abortion is illegal and there isn't really much of a debate

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In sweden its legal and i have never ever really heard anyone question it.

In Australia I believe that the law dictates that women require a legitimate reason to have an abortion, but I've never heard of a case of someone being refused an abortion because their reason wasn't good enough. Politicians have generally been reluctant to legislate or comment on the issue because it's so divisive, so it's been largely left in this quasi-legal limbo for the past 30 odd years.

Now though, with the conservative Howard government about to take full control of the senate in July (they already have control of the lower house, so come July they will effectively be able to pass through any legislation they desire for the first time in over 30 years) a lot of the Catholic ministers are beginning to speak up on the issue and - rather than banning abortion outright - they seem more intent on making abortions more difficult to obtain by restricting access to abortions under Medicare (the national public-health subsidy program), restricting the woman's right to privacy on the issue and so on. Health-care minister Tony Abbot (who has recently been involved in a very public and very hilarious paternity scandal about a child he gave up for adoption when he was 19) is, rather unfortunately, one of the leading advocates of implementing these sorts of measures.

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In Mexico it's illegal. Now, it can be legal as long as you traditional parents don't find out about it or as long as the people in the neighborhood don't find out about it. So it's legal if you're careful. But it's a sin if you're not.

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Originally posted by zig Yes you are correct....Basically it would be political suicide. The three major parties in Ireland avoid this issue if at all possible,and will only deal with the issue as constitutional challanges occur,it really is a hot potatoe but it is not illegal for women to travel to the UK with the full knowledge of the authorties.The three main political parties would not even attempt to legalise abortion,as there are so many pressure groups in Ireland mainly coming from a fundementalist religious point of view and no party wants to be seen as aligned with these people. But i think without a doubt that the electorate for the most part are happy with the current situation and i doubt that abortion will be legalised anytime soon,unless of course it was to be outlawed in the UK,and then a rethink on the current laws would have to be reviewed. But in the UK at the moment that is unlikely,although they are currently reviewing the time limits in which abortions can occur,at the moment i think it is 20 weeks and they want to increase this to 24 weeks (i think ? ) but there is no question of it being outlawed at present. There isnt any slang term that i can think of......

24 weeks?! I was born just before that point! That can't be the absolute youngest a child can be born and still survive. I say lower the time limit to something like 12 weeks.

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Originally posted by ali92 24 weeks?! I was born just before that point! That can't be the absolute youngest a child can be born and still survive. I say lower the time limit to something like 12 weeks.

well in 50 years we can probably save a baby without even having a mom, in that case that would make abortion illegal at all times.

My point is that even tho you can save someone doesnt mean it is already a human beeing.