So the Taoiseach wants to close the book on abortion. He is seeking a consensus on a most divisive political, legal, medical, social, ethical and moral issue - which has polarised Irish society for two decades - with the publication of the Government's proposals for a fifth and final referendum on the issue within the coming months. Fianna Fβil and the Progressive Democrats are to put a new amendment to add two new subsections to Article 40.3 of the Constitution in the Spring.
It remains to be seen whether the long-drawn out years of consultations since Mr Ahern first promised to regularise the constitutional/legal quagmire of abortion prior to the 1997 general election campaign will bear fruit. The complexities of the issue have been debated ad infinitum: in the Government's Green Paper in 1999 and the Report of the All-Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution in 2000. No agreement was reached in either fora on the way to proceed.
The outcome of these deliberations, according to the Taoiseach, led the Government to conclude that there is no simple sentence, or paragraph, that can be inserted into the Constitution which, by itself, would amount to a balanced, effective, legal response to the complex medical and legal issues which surround the protection of human life in pregnancy. Yet, the Government now believes that it can represent "the middle ground of public opinion" with its proposals for a new referendum.
The current legal position on abortion, after four abortion-related amendments, is contained in the Supreme Court judgment in the X case in 1992: Abortion is permissible in this State where there is a real and substantial risk to the life, as distinct from the health, of the mother, including the risk of suicide. The Government, in short, is attempting to exclude the risk of suicide.
The manner in which the Government proposes to do so, however, is calculated to garner the support of most reasonable people. It plans to add two subsections to Article 40.3: in particular, the life of the unborn in the womb shall be protected by the new Protection of Human Life in Pregnancy Act, 2002; any future legislative amendment must be approved by the people in the future. The Government also published the text of the Bill, where abortion is defined as "the intentional destruction by any means of unborn human life after implantation in the woman of a woman". The right to travel outside the State for an abortion where there is a risk of suicide is guaranteed.
The essence of the Government's plan is to row back on the Supreme Court's interpretation of Article 40.3.3 without changing the substantive wording of that section but by attempting to over-ride it with the provisions of a more restrictive regime in a Bill. The legitimacy of this procedure deserves the most serious scrutiny. The Taoiseach believes that he can achieve a consensus on abortion. The Pro-Life Campaign seems to be on board. The Labour Party is to oppose it. The Medical Council's guidelines are in conformity with it.
The referendum route now proposed is relatively conservative. It will not please the zealots on either side. But for the first time since this issue raised its head in the early 1980s, a sane and workable Irish solution may be on offer.