Lawyers for the Department of Health have told the High Court that Northern Ireland Health Minister Robin Swann, will not act unilaterally to broaden the provision of abortion in the Province. Instead the Minister plans to bring the matter to the Stormont Executive before any decision is made.
The commitment from Mr Swann’s legal team came in response to a last minute court action taken by the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC). The pro-life campaign group brought the case, Wednesday 21 July, just 24 hours before Mr Lewis was to issue a Direction to the Health department in an attempt to ramp-up abortion provision in the Province by bypassing the devolved administration.
Mr Lewis announced last week that he would issue a Direction on Thursday 22 July, instructing the Health Minister to allocate the funding and resources which he claims are required to implement Northern Ireland’s radical new abortion law. The law, imposed by the London Government in 2019, while devolution had been suspended, legalised abortion on demand within the first 12 weeks of pregnancy and makes it widely available until week 24. It also permits abortion up to birth for disabled babies as well as in other circumstances. However, a lack of agreement within the Executive regarding the extreme nature of the legislation has meant that its provisions have not yet been fully implemented.
Arguing the case before Mr Justice Colton, former Attorney General John Larkin, QC representing SPUC, called on the Health Department to make no additional allocation of resources without first consulting the Executive. The department’s legal team has since given an undertaking to provide notice in advance of any decision to act without Executive approval.
The challenge to the lawfulness of Mr Lewis’s powers to override the devolved administration by issuing directives is due to be heard 4 - 5 October 2021.
"A devolution power grab"
Speaking after the hearing, Liam Gibson SPUC Northern Ireland Political Officer accused Westminster of a “devolution power grab” which will impose draconian and radical abortion laws through the Abortion (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2021.
He said: “Abortion is not healthcare, it is an act of lethal violence directed at an unborn child. It is essential that the pro-life people of Northern Ireland contact the Health Minister and the Office of the First and deputy First Ministers and urge them to take no action to implement Mr Lewis’s abortion agenda, at least until the courts have had the opportunity to decide on the lawfulness of the powers the Secretary of State has conferred upon himself.
“If the London Government is able to impose an agenda which will condemn to death an untold number of unborn babies it will also fatally undermine the devolution settlement by stripping locally elected Ministers of power and denying the people an accountable government,” Mr Gibson said.