Wednesday, April 30, 2008
“It puts Northern Ireland on a par with the rest of the UK.”
The Northern Ireland Criminal Justice Minister Paul Goggins, MP, will introduce the Sexual Offences (Northern Ireland) Order 2008, noted previously here, in the House of Commons today. There was a consultation with the Assembly, but some Assembly members are not happy. From the NIO statement.
“The Order sets out the parameters of acceptable sexual activity in the 21st century and clearly states what the law will not tolerate.
“I am convinced that the changes will offer the people of Northern Ireland a modern legislative framework which will ensure maximum protection from unacceptable sexual activity. It puts Northern Ireland on a par with the rest of the UK.”
Pete Baker @ 12:19 PM
New labour wielding it’s big stick,devolve P&J;or you will get legislation you don’t like.If you want to have control over these issues the onus is on you.
Posted by on Apr 30, 2008 @ 11:50 PMAs a (sort of) unionist
Why isn’t abortion legal here? It should be.
As for the sexual consent thing…
just 1 more reason why direct rule should be reimposed.
What was ever wrong with direct rule anyway?Posted by on Apr 30, 2008 @ 11:59 PMBob Wilson - “I say ‘introducing’ because in reality abortion is already as available in NI as anywhere else in the UK but you have to fly to GB to physically have an abortion”
You make it sound so terribly simple. It isn’t. Many Northern Irish women do not have either the information or financial resources to just hop on a plane and obtain a hasty abortion. The FPA provides abortion information, but a lot of women will still go to their GP first and the response they get there depends entirely on the GP’s stance on abortion.
If they decide to go ahead with a termination, they have to pay travel expenses, possibly overnight accommodation, and quite often make work/family arrangements. Sometimes they have to do all of this without anyone ever finding out that they’re planning on having an abortion. Oh yeah, and then when they get to England, they have to pay £500+ for the actual abortion.
Yeah, it’s easy enough to get an abortion if you have the money. That’s precisely why this issue has dragged on for decades without being properly addressed - only the most vulnerable women have ever suffered, and who really cares about them?
Driftwood -
Legally, abortion isn’t available in Northern Ireland under the conditions of the 1967 Abortion Act simply because the Act was never extended to Northern Ireland. Therefore, Northern Irish abortion law is still based on the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act, which basically only allows abortion if the life of the woman is in danger. However, at least some abortions are performed here outside of this law but it is very much done at the discretion of individual doctors and midwives. The FPA have been trying to get the law clarified since 2001 and it still hasn’t happened (the assembly rejected the proposed Department of Health guidelines without a vote in October).
The reality is, there has been a concerted effort from the pro-life/religious right (on both sides) to make it appear that there is no popular support for abortion in Northern Ireland. This is false - all opinion polls done in the 90s/early 00s (though none have been done very recently that I’m aware of) indicated that there was support for a more liberal law and this reflects polls done in the Republic of Ireland as well (and their consistent favouring of the pro-choice position in referendums backs this up).
Politicians have chosen to completely ignore the fact that thousands of Northern Irish women are having abortions each year so that they can maintain the mantra that there is no abortion in Northern Ireland. These women are citizens of the United Kingdom and they are being shamefully exported from their own country so that our politicians can claim to speak on behalf of us all from some moral high ground. They have all the Christian compassion in the world for fetuses, and not one bit of it for the women they want to force to carry them against their will. Debate and compromise is impossible because the anti-abortion lobby simply can’t get beyond “abortion killz babies oh noes!!!1” (reflected in many, many comments in the numerous posts about this issue on Slugger).
It is a ridiculous situation and it absolutely needs to end now.
(P.S. Thanks Pete for seemingly being the only person who ever posts about these issues.)
Posted by on May 01, 2008 @ 02:53 AMBonarlaw
“I think you seriously over-estimate the reach of the Government of Ireland.”Where have you been for the last ten years? It won’t happen unless Dublin gives the go-ahead.
Posted by on May 01, 2008 @ 05:53 AMJoanne - excellent post.
Posted by on May 01, 2008 @ 06:25 AMJoanne - I think you took me up wrong I was attempting to point up the absurdity of the current set up.
Posted by on May 01, 2008 @ 07:32 AM>>The so called “union” is a sham, £ngland is sick to death of bankrolling pathetic feeble irrelevant little Regions like N Ireland, Wales and Scotregion.<<
Steve, if by the Scotregion you mean the soon to be most progressive nation this earth has ever had the pleasure of hosting. Then you are wrong. Scotland is not bankrolled by England, the ‘big lie’ has been exposed. Now I realise that it was just a throwaway line with a larger meaning. However, larger meanings, erroneous on this occassion often can be found elsewhere in the subtext also.
Dewi - Joanne - excellent post.
Joanne - Debate and compromise is impossible because the anti-abortion lobby simply can’t get beyond “abortion killz babies oh noes!!!1”
Really?!?!
Posted by on May 01, 2008 @ 07:37 AMPE:
“Really?!?! ”Pretty much.
Posted by on May 01, 2008 @ 10:11 AMJoanne,
I suspect there is a differnet attitude to abortion in non iron (and ROI) to that in Britian. The way to reflect this difference and to maintain it, if that is what the people in Non Iron want, is by them being repsonsible for their own legislation on this issue.
The abortion debate is extermely difficult because it attempts to reconcile what is two unreconlilable and competing rights - the right of fertislised egg/foetus/child and the right of the mother.
Because someone feels that the right of the ‘child’ is parmaount because unless it threatens the life of the mother it is more important so preserve a ‘life’ than to give the mother the right to terminate that ‘life’ is ceratinly an arguement that deserves to be aired, respected and listened to ( though not one I fully agree with).
By its nature this is an emotional debate and dismissing the anti-abortionists simply becuase they put forward their point ‘it is wrong to kill’ (my parpaphrasing ) is really playing the (wo)man and and not the ball.
Posted by on May 01, 2008 @ 12:23 PMIs it true that a woman from Northern Ireland is not entitled to an abortion on the NHS if she travels to England/Scotland/Wales, and instead has to pay to go private?
Posted by on May 01, 2008 @ 05:07 PMAbortion is legalised infanticide.In the UK almost 200000 unborn babies are murdered each year,that represents a holocost+ since 1967.If some woman think that a child will cramp their style or impinge upon their career their is the option of giving the child up for adoption,abortion rates in the UK are among the highest in Europe,it is being used as a method of anti-conception in lieu of contraception ,many methods of which are - by their modus operandi abortificient.An unborn baby is NOT part of a woman’s body,s/he is a person who is being nosted in the first 9 months of development by the mother.
If I was to give any of you a lift in my car, would I have the right to drive my car into a wall at 60mph-after all it is my life -it is my car.
Posted by on May 02, 2008 @ 12:23 AM
