Unsurprisingly, the Bill proposed by Socialist Party / United Left Alliance TD, Clare Daly to legislate for the X Case, was overwhelming defeated in the Dail. The establishment fail yet again; women suffer, and working class and economically deprived women who can’t or find it difficult to muster the money to travel to access a termination, and migrant women and women trapped in abusive relationships who have restrictions on their travel, suffer most acutely.
In April of this year, the government parties, including the Labour Party that claims to have a pro-choice position, shamefully rejected a bill to legislate for the X Case, introduced by Socialist Party TD, Clare Daly. The persistent conservatism of the political establishment was exposed and women in Ireland (like the estimated 150,000 women who have travelled abroad to access a termination since 1980 before them), continue to suffer the consequences.
For more than a century, 8 March has been the day to commemorate and celebrate the fight of working class and revolutionary women for a better deal and a socialist society. Its origins are in the struggles for equal pay and decent conditions amongst women in the USA in the 19th century.