Reluctant to say Yes or No, but implicitly in favour

Regional papers: Regional papers have generally been reluctant to advocate a particular position in the forthcoming abortion…

Regional papers: Regional papers have generally been reluctant to advocate a particular position in the forthcoming abortion referendum, but the Limerick Leader has explicitly urged its readers to vote Yes.

Other papers contained Yes inflections in their editorial comments.

The Limerick Leader's editorial notes how the referendum campaign "locally cuts across denominations as it does political parties".

While acknowledging the legal and constitutional complexities of the debate, the paper says "morally abortion might be seen as a comparatively simple question".

READ MORE

It says "essentially the current proposal protects the baby and the mother. Defeat would open up the possibility of increased dangers to both. It will therefore be wise next Wednesday to vote Yes."

The Nationalist said in its editorial that it was up to its readers to decide how they want to vote, but "we believe the introduction of abortion even in very limited form for exceptional and hard cases is not in the interests of Irish society and the Irish people."

It said the phrase "right to choose" invariably entered the abortion debate, usually being associated with the right of a woman to make her own choice regarding pregnancy termination.

However the newspaper said it used the phrase this week "in its more global and general context - the right of the people of Ireland to choose the kind of society they wish to live and rear their families in."

The Anglo-Celt, too, did not tell its readers which way to vote, but its editorial said "change is needed in our present abortion position".

It said the judgment in the X case meant there was "no time limit on the age of a foetus which may be aborted. That is wholly unacceptable and obtains in law nowhere else where abortion is widely legal and availed of."

Voters, it said, must decide if the referendum proposals "offer the best, and most compassionate, approach while ensuring that a regime of easy abortion cannot be established here".

The editorial comment in the Longford Leader is broadly representative of the sentiment of many regional papers.

Most people, it said, did not know what the referendum was actually about.

Spokespeople of different organisations had behaved obnoxiously, the paper said, because "they are attempting to force people to vote, on what is essentially a moral issue, in accordance with what they tell us instead of in accordance with our own consciences".