THE Fianna Fail leader has moved quickly to reject the Pro-Life Campaign's (PLC) new wording for a constitutional amendment on abortion, believing he has ended the disarray within the party on the issue.
Within hours of publication, Mr Bertie Ahern set out to distance himself from the PLC by stating that his own people were able to identify a number of difficulties straight away that could arise with the wording. "That is always the problem as soon as someone produces a wording," he said.
Anxious to remove abortion from the political agenda, Mr Ahern gave an open commitment to a meeting of the Fianna Fail parliamentary party yesterday to consult them before any constitutional or legislative action is taken after the general election.
He told members that two options were open to everyone, not just Fianna Fail, to deal with the consequences of the Supreme Court judgment in the X case: legislation only or legislation and a referendum. The party would not make any decision until the expert group established by him had finalised its report.
The opinions produced by the group would be brought back to the front bench and the parliamentary party would make a decision on it at that time.
This position was unanimously agreed by the 64 members at the meeting, according to the chairman of the parliamentary party, Dr Rory O'Hanlon, who was the only other speaker.
Dr O'Hanlon gave TDs and senators the option of having a discussion on the party's position, as outlined by Mr Ahern, at the meeting or waiting until the expert group had reported. A full debate was declined.
"Being the largest party on the island, which is unanimously against abortion, there are different views on it," he added.
Dr O'Hanlon also suggested that the unanimous view emerging from the meeting was that people should not go out and express personal views on abortion.
It was also decided that Mr Ahern's address would be circulated to all Fianna Fail candidates for the general election.
Meanwhile, in an RTE interview yesterday, Mr Ahern repeated that a conclusion to the abortion issue would have to be reached in the shape of legislation or a constitutional amendment.
He said the issue would not become an important one in the forthcoming election but he admitted that the party was divided on the matter. "Everyone in the party does not see the matter the same way.
"There are very different views in our parliamentary party. Some people believe an amendment would resolve it, other people believe that legislation would resolve it," he said.
"The point is that it may mean legislation and it might also mean a constitutional amendment."
Mr Ahern said there was no easy way of dealing with the fall-out from the X case judgment. "I think people in Fianna Fail would like to see the matter put beyond doubt and if that requires an amendment and legislation, we'd be quite happy to do so," he said.
"A lot of my parliamentary party colleagues and people around the country who have nothing to do with Fianna Fail find it odd that we continue to call on the people to make decisions about bail, the right to silence and cabinet confidentiality but in an important issue where they all have views we seem to run a mile from giving them any say in it," he said.
"The issue must be legislated for, if it's possible to do that on its own. If that's not possible you have to look at the wording. I'm not saying there has to be another referendum," said Mr Ahern.
Mr Ahern rejected the suggestion that the party was in "disarray".
