20 years on - Action on the X Case - Public Meeting

dublin | rights, freedoms and repression | event notice Tuesday February 14, 2012 19:42 by Action on X - Action on X actiononx at gmail dot com

20 years after the X case and we are still waiting on abortion legislation

Join Action on X for a discussion on the X case, 20 years on

As yet another expert committee convenes to consider how the Government might implement the 20-year-old Supreme Court ruling on the X Case, the Action on X Alliance says: Enough!

On February 21st, 1992, the High Court issued a permanent injunction which barred a 14-year-old girl, known only as X, from leaving the country to terminate her pregnancy, the result of rape. Two weeks later the Supreme Court ruled that when a pregnant woman’s life is in danger, including from suicide, she has the right to an abortion here in Ireland.

Yet in 2012 after all the expert committees, after two referendums in which the people vindicated a woman’s right to life-saving abortion, after several court rulings doing the same and an acknowledgment from Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore that such legislation is necessary – all we’ve got is another expert committee.

The delay is inexcusable and unacceptable. Legislation is long overdue. The courts have ruled, the people have spoken – it's time for the Government to act.

The Action on X Alliance had been formed by concerned groups and individuals to campaign on the immediate passing of this ruling into law as directed by the Supreme Court and also one year after the C case judgment in the European Court of Human Rights

Vincent Browne, Journalist and Broadcaster
Anthea McTeirnan, Journalist and Reproductive Rights Activist
Dr Fiona De Londras, UCD School of Law
Mick Wallace, Independent TD for Wexford
Ailbhe Smyth, Feminist Open Forum
Anne Ferris - Labour TD
Goretti Horgan - Derry Women, Socialist Workers Party