Life matters

Predictably enough, there have been no calls this week for the Irish referendum on abortion to be re-run, no complaint from Ken Clarke about the ‘-tyranny of the majority’, no moaning that the campaign had been in any way unfair. Neither should there have been. The Irish people have made a fair and democratic choice and the result should be respected.

Less respect seems to have been forthcoming, however, for the views of the Northern Irish on abortion. On the contrary, no sooner was the result from south of the border announced than the calls began for the government in Westminster to impose its will on Northern Ireland and liberalise the province’s abortion laws. Shadow attorney general Shami Chakrabarti, playing on Theresa May’s claim to be a feminist, suggested ‘the test of feminists is whether they stick up for all women’ and impose liberal abortion laws on the province. It was a remark which was ignorant as well as intolerant — far from ‘all women’ supporting abortion, polls which have broken down responses according to gender have tended to show that women generally have less favourable views towards liberal abortion policies than men do. A recent ComRes poll, for example, revealed that 60 per cent of the UK population support a reduction in the limit for abortion from 24 weeks to 20 weeks — broken down into 49 per cent of men and 70 per cent of women.

Sir Vince Cable, meanwhile, demanded that the government take advantage of the temporary lack of an assembly at Stormont, saying: ‘The position in Northern Ireland is now highly anomalous and I think probably action will now have to be taken.’ The same argument could be said about the different policies across the United Kingdom on fracking, drink-driving and on many other issues where the Scottish Parliament or Welsh or Northern Irish assemblies have chosen to adopt different polices from those which apply in England.