Oireachtas committee is a propaganda exercise – members

Oireachtas committee is a propaganda exercise – members

A parliamentary committee to consider Ireland’s constitutional protections for unborn children appears to be a pro-abortion “propaganda exercise”, two committee members who are considering stepping down have said.

Highlighting how among the ‘expert witnesses’ addressing the committee was the New York-based Centre for Reproductive Rights, which has been fundraising in the US to overturn Ireland’s pro-life laws, independent TD Mattie McGrath and Senator Ronan Mullen said this “shows how skewed in favour of abortion the Committee’s work has become”.

The duo noted that when the committee began its work, much was made of how it would hear from expert witnesses but not from ‘advocacy groups’.

“We already had serious concerns about the one-sided nature of the process but this latest revelation takes things to a whole new level,” they said, emphasising that while they were not criticising individual committee members, “there’s no escaping that this process is entirely skewed and unfair”.

Pointing out how nobody representing people whose lives had been saved by the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution had been called to address the committee, while over 20 groups and individuals arguing for legal abortion had been summoned, they said the process had “become a farce”.

“The Citizens’ Assembly never considered for a second the positive and life-saving impact of the Eighth Amendment and now the Oireachtas is shirking its responsibility too,” they said, adding that they were actively considering whether there’s any point in our remaining on as members.