Why Target a Law That Gives Mothers Time to Choose Life?

Why is Ruth Coppinger attempting to introduce a bill in the Dail to remove the three day waiting period before an abortion?

Why would she seek to remove a ruling that is proving very successful in giving mothers valuable time to consider such an important decision and saving life? The figures speak for themselves - between 2019 and 2024 over 10,441 women did not return for a second abortion consultation and have had their babies. Ms Coppinger professes to be a fighter for women and I have to agree that she, her colleague Paul Murphy, and her party People before Profit have put up a mighty fight to provide an abortion service for those women who want one.

But what about those women who knowing that they are pregnant, instinctively form a nurturing, protective attachment to their child but are driven, often in panic, to seek an abortion by circumstances outside of their control? Maybe they are homeless, coerced by a partner, can't afford to raise a child or are in need of support and encouragement?

Do these women not deserve Government provision of pregnancy support services on a par with the abortion service? And are they not present in MS Coppinger's constituency of Dublin West in an equal ratio as they are in the rest of the country?

For a just society and a viable society we need to see equality of provision for both women who wish to have their babies and those who do not.

David Quinn writing in the Sunday Independent on24 August 2025 maintained that our birth rate is falling rapidly across the continent with deaths outnumbering births by well over a million every single year. In his view the massive demographic changes taking place need urgent and sustained attention.

In May 2018, prior to the Abortion Referendum, the Government published the intended legislation of the Act which explicitly included a mandatory three day waiting period between initial consultation and legal termination of pregnancy. This was to allay voter fears of unlimited abortion and to ensure the bill would be passed.

The Irish people were lied to. From the day the Abortion Act was passed the political left have worked against the spirit of the Act and the intention of voters at the time, to rapidly increase and accelerate the number of babies dying in the womb.

Instead of our politicians now calling for urgent action to reduce abortion rates and to put in place pregnancy support services we have Ms Coppinger, her party, and the other major parties all seeking to add to the rate of 1 in 6 babies dying under Ireland's abortion regime.