The morality of equating the life of a mature female adult with that of a zygote was questioned by the Association of Irish Humanists at the abortion hearings yesterday.
Mr Justin Keating, president of the association, said society did not have a right to impose motherhood on a woman who did not want it or could not cope with it. "In none of these situations can the moral status and rights of human persons be outweighed by consideration of a being which is yet to acquire the inherent rights of a human person," the former politician said.
Mr Keating said the Government should consider setting up an abortion facility in Ireland. "But make it very difficult to get an abortion. Abortion on demand is clearly undesirable," Mr Keating said.
He said the humanists' association was a democratic grouping who believed that humans had a right to give shape to their own lives. He said they respected all forms of human life, "including embryonic life, and the human being even more so."
Mr Keating questioned the morality of a law which resulted in droves of women travelling to England for abortions. Mr Keating said the number of women travelling to England for abortions was closer to 10,000 than 6,500 a year.
Meanwhile, barristers Mr Shane Murphy and Mr Benedict O Floinn argued that the Government could impose a complete ban on abortion in Ireland, while allowing the existing medical treatment to expectant mothers confronted with life-threatening illness. They said that such wording was neither impossible nor impracticable.
An argument for a retention of the status quo was made by Mr Joseph Foyle. Mr Foyle said there was no need for another referendum because the current situation was "totally adequate".
He said that the only downside of the current situation was that it left the door open for abortion on the grounds that the mother was at risk of committing suicide. "But there's no need to go to the expense of another referendum just to get this out," he said.
Mr Foyle said to allow abortion in circumstances such as rape or suicidal threat was to foster irresponsibility.
The public abortion hearings have now finished. The Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution is expected to present its report on its findings in September.
