I also welcome the Bill and thank Sinn Féin for its work in bringing it to the Dáil floor. Repeal is deeply a part of who we are as a party. There are many members and, indeed, elected representatives within our party who were politically mobilised and activated by their experience in repeal and who feel passionately about the full implementation of the repeal movement and what it means for women and reproductive rights in Ireland. I welcome, most importantly, the opportunity to address what is a legislative gap that was identified in the O'Shea report and urgently needs to be addressed. The three-day wait is a hangover of the infantilising, patronising and misogynistic treatment of women that we have seen recur many times in our provision of health services in this country. Symphysiotomy is another example. There are many more ways in which women have been mistreated through the provision of healthcare and this is another example. What we learned from the repeal campaign and the stories of so many women, and, since then, the implementation of the legislation and the provision of abortion care in Ireland, is that women know their own bodies. Women need to be trusted. Twenty-six years ago, I was in the middle of a crisis pregnancy. I was a young woman. I was not in a relationship with my daughter's father. In many ways, people would have expected me to be a prime candidate for an abortion. I remember from the moment I got pregnant that I wanted the baby. We talk a lot about choice. For me, it was compulsion. There was no decision-making. When we think about choice and what women go through, we think that they sit down and tot things up. That was not my experience. Many friends of mine have accessed abortion care. On paper, they probably had the types of circumstance that people would not have assumed would prompt them towards termination. The reality is that we, ourselves individually and in consultation with appropriate healthcare providers, know our minds, bodies, health and circumstances, and we know our own family planning. We need to be able to access it. The imposition of a three-day waiting period goes against all of that. By all means, if people wish to self-impose a three-day waiting period, they absolutely should if it makes sense to them. Going back to that determination of choice, we need to speak to and listen to women, and we know that the three-day waiting period, if it is imposed in a mandatory way, is wrong and redundant and simply must go. It is regrettable that this legislation does not cover the comprehensive gaps we know are there. The O'Shea report came of the review mechanism that was built into the 2018 Act. It provided an analysis of the implementation and a clear roadmap for how to address those gaps. Those operational gaps have been filled, as we know, by the Department through the provision across multiple hospitals and all the different ways it can be done without legislation. There have, however, been tumbleweeds in respect of the legislative changes recommended in the report. It is welcome that the Bill is being welcomed by the Government. There are indications that Government representatives will be voting in favour of it. However, I find it hard to stomach that our own legislation was not supported in the same way just a couple of weeks ago. Any concerns about these additional measures, which we know need to be addressed, could have been ironed out on Committee Stage. The Minister of State spoke in her opening comments about an open and respectful debate. That is all we were seeking in providing for comprehensive coverage of the gaps that were identified by Marie O'Shea in a way that we believed would provide a positive legislative roadmap going forward. If we cast our minds back to 2018, we know it was the case that many voters in Ireland were swayed by the stories of women who had experienced fatal foetal abnormalities and how the Irish healthcare system treated them. That experience continues today. Women who welcome the pregnancies and want these children are being forced to travel and to bring back their baby's bodies in the boots of their cars. That is happening this week and we must address it. We will continue to push for the full legislative changes that are required, that were recommended in the O'Shea report, and that will bring Ireland up to the level of care that we know women deserve in reproductive healthcare. I look forward to proposing amendments to this legislation that I know our party will support and I look forward to discussing on Committee Stage how we can proactively support that. As Deputy Rice has pointed out, it would be such a shame to expend all of our political capital addressing one isolated part of what we know is a comprehensive set of legislative gaps and make those women wait. I believe most of us in society connected with those women as part of this dialogue in recent years. We must help them to find the solutions they need.

Sentiment score: 0.15