Abortion: New law will take at least a year to enact
A Yes vote is becoming less likely, ministers fear
GOVERNMENT sources have told the Irish Mail on Sunday that new abortion laws will not be introduced for at least a year – even if everything goes to plan.
Ministers also conceded that the increasingly fragmented views of parties and senior politicians mean a Yes vote is less likely that they believed a week ago.
Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, Health Minister Simon Harris and Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin are all supporting a Yes vote. But ministers and opposition parties said last week’s announcement by Tánaiste Simon Coveney that he will oppose his own Government’s legislative proposals could significantly lengthen the timeline.
The Government intends to hold the referendum on Friday, May 25.
Mr Coveney said he supported repeal of the Eighth Amendment but opposed the introduction of unrestricted abortion up to 12 weeks.
A female Fine Gael TD privately said last night that she believed the Tánaiste was ‘playing politics’ and that what he had said in a radio interview with RTÉ’s Seán O’Rourke this week was ‘garbled’.
Another said: ‘I don’t believe he’s thought this through.’
Angry pro-repeal Fine Gael TDs have told Mr Coveney that he should resign as Tánaiste if he won’t back the proposed legislation. One senior TD told the MoS: ‘The Tánaiste has been a car crash since this started. He has been pathetic. If he is prepared to sabotage the Harris Bill, he must resign.’
Fianna Fáil’s Lisa Chambers said Mr Coveney was ‘speaking out of both sides of his mouth’ and trying to play politics with abortion.
There is a belief in Fine Gael that Mr Coveney is seeking to differentiate himself from former rival Mr Varadkar and court the conservative sections of the party.
A spokesman for Mr Coveney dismissed this: ‘The Tánaiste has set out his stance. He is not looking to bring people along or for anyone to back him.
‘He has been in constant contact with the Taoiseach and the Minister for Health, the former just this morning, and both are content he has laid out what he thinks.’
Mr Coveney’s spokesman also dismissed the suggestion that the Tánaiste should step down.
He said: ‘He, like everyone else in Fine Gael, has a free vote on this matter of conscience.’
Mr Coveney is one of a number of senior government figures who have expressed reservations over the 12-week limit, including Communications Minister Denis Naughten, Junior Defence Minister Paul Kehoe and Rural Affairs Minister Michael Ring.
Three Ministers – Mr Coveney, Agriculture Minister Michael Creed and Government Chief Whip Joe McHugh – have formally confirmed their objection to the proposals.
Ministers admit that the confusion created by dissenting views at the top of Government might lengthen an already long process of introducing abortion legislation. That is all in the context of the ending of the confidence-and-supply arrangement with Fianna Fáil in October – after which a general election becomes far more likely. One senior Government source said: ‘Let’s assume the referendum is the last Friday in May, and let’s hope the people vote Yes: that leaves you four to six weeks of Dáil time [the Dáil usually rises the first week of July]. ‘There’s always a rush to get ordinary legislation finalised in those weeks,’ he added. ‘Nothing will be done before summer and when it returns in late September, the Dáil only sits three days a week.
‘The Budget is due less than a month after that, in mid-October, and the confidence-and-supply arrangement expires just after that. All that while you have Brexit. And when will the general election be? At the most optimistic this could take a year. But if you look at the fact that it took four years to introduce the Public Health Alcohol Bill, it will be slow.’ Up to 50% of TDs now oppose legislating to allow abortion up to 12 weeks.
But a Government source said ministers were still confident of getting the legislation passed, claiming there was definitely a Dáil majority to support it.
I think the members of parliament and the public will look at a lot of the information and change their minds. I think ultimately a majority will support it,’ said Fine Gael Senator Catherine Noone, who chaired the all-party committee on abortion.
She said she was not surprised at Mr Coveney’s intervention. ‘I understood where he was coming from, but I didn’t fully understand his explanation for his decision.’
Minister Harris told the MoS: ‘I think we have an ambitious but doable timetable that could deliver a referendum by the end of May.’
But pro-life Independent TD Mattie McGrath said he believed there was still a long way to go in campaign. ‘We saw that the Government lost two referendums that Enda Kenny put to the people because they did not trust them. They could do that in the case of abortion too.’
‘The Tánaiste has been a car crash since it started’ ‘Lost two referendums under Enda Kenny’