ARC March for Choice: Take women’s reproductive decisions out of the Constitution

Published: Saturday, September 24, 2016

As thousands of women take to the streets across Ireland and globally in the Abortion Rights Campaign 2016 March for Choice, the National Women’s Council of Ireland (NWCI) has reiterated calls to repeal the 8th amendment, without further delays.

Frances Byrne, Chair of NWCI said,
“The National Women’s Council of Ireland, representing our 190 group members across the country, has a strong democratic mandate to campaign to repeal the 8th amendment from the Constitution, and to replace it with legislation to ensure women have access to the full range of essential reproductive health services. The huge numbers marching today are indicative of a growing campaign, and highlight the passionate engagement with the issue from communities all across Ireland.”

Frances Byrne continued,
“Restrictive abortion laws do not stop abortion, but they do cause immense hardship to women forced to travel, and even more so to women who cannot travel. Today, thousands of women, both in Ireland and other major cities in Europe and further afield, are saying that this is no longer acceptable, and that we must care for women in this country. The time for incremental change is gone; we must listen to women and put a referendum to the people.”

Frances Byrne concluded,
“We saw with the marriage equality campaign that popular mobilisation can bring about progressive social change.   It is crucial that the conversations about repealing the 8th amendment needs to happen in every community throughout Ireland. NWCI has recently announced that it will be holding regional consultations with women and men in all their diversity and perspectives across the country, particularly rural members, to open the debate.  We need to have inclusive  conversations about what comes after repeal, and how we can ensure that women have access to a wide range of reproductive services, including abortion.”

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