Irish women fight for igh right to choose

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An estimated 9,000 Irish women each year travel to England for the abortions they are denied in the Republic.

Nevertheless, the abortion issue has only recently begun to be debated in public. The organised opposition of the Catholic Church is such that for years the subject has been swept under the carpet, condemned out of hand from the pulpit and its confessional.

Up to now, the 'Wellwoman Clinic' in Dublin has enabled women in the Republic to obtain the abortions they need by referring them to English private clinics and arranging travel and accommodation for them.

This, of course, cannot be a free service and creates difficulties for women with low incomes.

Even so, the Wellwoman (which deals with all aspects of women's health) has found itself unable to cope with the demand for their abortion referral service.

A couple of weeks ago, seven women in Dublin got together to form a Right to Choose Group' which as well as planning to campaign for contraceptive rights and choice on abortion, has already set up its own abortion referral centre.

Donations

This is funded by donations, and now has a full time organiser and trained staff.

The campaign for abortion rights within the Republic has only just started. Already the question has been raised, tempestuously, in the National Union of Journalists, which organises in the Republic as well as in the UK.

Right wing members objected to the Union's pro-choice policy, demanding that it should not be applicable to the Republic!

The campaign for the right to abortion must now be carried into other British-based unions which have a pro-choice policy -and into the wider Irish labour movement.

Support for its referral centre must also be sought from Dublin Trades Council, although at this early stage it is not likely to be immediately forthcoming.

Indeed even some of the small feminist groups in Dublin do not have a pro-choice policy for fear of alienating women.

Not only is the abortion issue hotly disputed, but the Church and state are both organising against contraception and the Family Planning Clinics.

These at present are technically legal, operating a loophole in existing legislation-since it is illegal to sell contraceptives they just give them away, and survive on donations alone.

Legislation

Haughey's new Bill aims to put an end to this: clinics which refuse to comply with the new legislation will have to organise support from the women who use their service and from the wider labour movement if they are to survive.

Needless to say, this is a class issue. Irish women like women elsewhere, can vade anti-contraception and anti-abortion legislation if they have the money.

Status

Indeed, the fact that England is so near, relatively, is commonly used as an argument for not fighting the status quo at home.

Both these issues will be on the agenda for the meeting of the International Abortion, Contraception and Sterlisation Campaign' which is meeting in Dublin on 18-19 October at the invitation of the 'Right to Choose Group'.

It is vital that, from this meeting, the referral clinic and the family planning clinics get the active support they need from Irish women and the Irish labour movement.

ASACTION CR CLIMER KLa LEGAL CO NO Dublin march ACK IRDAPOTE