The Taoiseach's answers to Mr Michael Noonan's 34 questions throw little new light on the Government's proposals for an abortion referendum, which is to be accompanied by legislation. But they do highlight a high-wire act of political expediency. The potential for divergences and ambiguity which follows from the deliberate eschewing of legal definitions in the text would seem to suggest that one way or another this abortion regime will also end up in the courts.
For all of that, the Fine Gael party should be commended for raising pertinent questions about the complexity of the proposals before coming to a judgment on them; and likewise the Taoiseach and the Attorney General for being forthright in their answers. The Bill will be debated in the Dβil on Wednesday.
The Government believes that it can reconcile the general right to life of the unborn in Article 40.3.3 of the Constitution with its legislative proposal to protect from intentional destruction "unborn human life after implantation in the womb of a woman" . It maintains that it is not setting out to "reinterpret" or "redefine" the term "unborn". The Government holds that it would be "not practicable" to attempt to protect the fertilised ovum prior to implantation in the womb of a woman by the criminal law of abortion. It thereby circumvents the Catholic Church's definition of human life as commencing at the point of conception by not defining "human life" at all.
In summary, the Government defines "abortion" for the purposes of its proposals but consciously attempts to shut out the ethical, philosophical, moral and theological debate surrounding it. It does not even define the medical conditions which could put the life of a pregnant woman at risk. The amendment and legislation are designed to operate on the basis of legal and factual practicality.
The architecture of this abortion referendum is different from the amendment on the substantive issue put before the people in 1992. But there is no escaping from the conclusion that the bottom line is the same. The intention is to row-back on the "X" case by eliminating the threat of suicide as grounds for securing an abortion in Ireland. The Taoiseach is blunt and direct in his answers that the problems of "X" and "C", rape and even incest in under-age girls, can be exported.
There is no doubt that this Irish solution now proposed for the Irish problem of abortion is grounded in the clearest hypocrisy. A blind eye will be turned to the 6,000 Irish women who travel to Britain each year for abortions. There is evidence, however, that the pro- and anti-abortion elements are not prepared to wrestle with the issue with the zeal they did before. Only one party, the Labour Party, has so far decided to oppose the referendum. But it took no action on the "X" case as a member of two Coalition Governments in 1992 and 1994. Perhaps the proposed political compromise is a mirror image of who and what we are.