Random Ramblings

RTE News

In short - a 17 year old girl has had the police called on her by the Health Service Executive to prevent her from travelling to England for an abortion. What the hell? I voted in the referendum that gave us the Thirteenth Amendment. “This subsection shall not limit freedom to travel between the State and another state.” That’s fairly plain and simple - “shall not limit freedom to travel”! Who the hell gave the HSE the right to overturn the decision of the people of Ireland?

And that’s without even going into why she wants to do it. The baby has a condition called anencephaly, which means the baby’s brain is not developing properly. It will only lives days after it is born. And this young woman has decided that an abortion is what she wants. Of course it’s not available in this country so she has to take the Irish solution - aka the boat.

Not good enough already? The HSE made the decision that she couldn’t travel unless there was a risk that she would commit suicide. X case all over again. So now she just has to say that she’s suicidal to be allowed to travel. Well done boys and girls in the HSE. Make a 17 year old girl express suicidal tendencies - nice move. Thankfully she has more sense and is pursuing it through the Courts instead - bet you never thought she’d do that.

[UPDATE 1 May]
The first stage is complete. The High Court has given her leave to bring a legal action against the HSE. It’ll be heard on Thursday. The Attorney General’s counsel has stated that the HSE have no right to direct the gardai and the gardai have no right to restrain her from travelling. Her mother also appeared in court and gave the young woman full support. Hopefully sense will prevail on Thursday.

Finally Bertie has called it. It wasn’t just the opposition that were getting fed up with the delays. Everyone knew it would be in May but he had to wait until the last minute didn’t he? So 3 weeks for the campaign.

And what are the choices? FF/Green, FG/Labour/Green are the two main ones it’s looking like. The PD’s are screwed - so that’s a good thing anyway. Despite what’s happening up North I still can’t see SF making it into government - regardless of how many seats they get. The main parties just aren’t ready to … party.

I’ll be watching the campaign closely personally. We need a change of government badly. FF have been there too long and they’re just getting cocky. As if they can get away with anything. Well, let’s face it - they can. We let them. An Taoiseach can do anything at all and nothing seems to stick. Time to change that. Not that Kenny is a great alternative to be honest. But at least he is an alternative.

Yeah I know. It’s another blog. I might even do something with it at some stage. Like comment on the upcoming election in Ireland. Or something.

Stay tuned. Or not :p