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.
The Draft Bill legislating for X case is designed to placate reactionary elements of Fine Gael and seeks to criminalise and punish women in crisis pregnancies. The pro-choice movement must mobilise to exert maximum pressure on the government to remove the worst provisions in the draft and maintain the fight for a referendum to repeal eighth amendment.
On Sunday the 14th of August thousands of people marched in Dublin in opposition of the continued denial of marriage rights for same-sex couples in Ireland.