JOHN SMEATON, DIRECTOR OF SPUC: It's a truly tragic day for Northern Ireland's unborn children and their mothers

Monday, 30 November 2015

It's a truly tragic day for Northern Ireland's unborn children and their mothers

Liam Gibson

Liam Gibson, SPUC's development officer in Northern Ireland, has just issued the following statement on a truly tragic day for Ireland's unborn children and their mothers:

BELFAST 30 November 2015: The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC), the UK’s leading pro-life organisation, says that the ruling by the High Court that Northern Ireland’s ban on abortion breaches human rights is “dangerously flawed”.

SPUC is calling on the Attorney General to work with pro-life groups to mount a robust appeal against the judgement.

Earlier this year the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission applied for a judicial review of the law. The Commission claimed that the law, which prohibits abortion, violates the European Convention on Human Rights because it does not make exceptions for children who are disabled or whose mothers had been victims of rape or sexual assault.

Liam Gibson, the Northern Ireland development officer for SPUC, which intervened in the case, said:

“The ruling by Judge Mark Horner is dangerously flawed. The judge misrepresented the protection of children before birth in case law and statute law in Northern Ireland. He also confused the separate legal issues of viability and the capacity to be born alive.”

Liam Gibson continued:

“Not one universal human rights treaty recognises a right to abortion. However, the right to life is shared by all members of the human family. The Declaration on the Rights of the Child (DRC) acknowledges that ‘the child, by reason of his physical and mental immaturity, needs special safeguards and care, including appropriate legal protection, before as well as after birth’. The DRC explicitly states that the need for such special safeguards is ‘recognised in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights’.”

The greatest strength of SPUC's campaign in Northern Ireland over the past several decades has been the united opposition to abortion by the overwhelming majority of the community by Catholics and Protestants alike. May that unity, supported by prayer, grow ever stronger as we work to restore the protection of the law for unborn children, the most persecuted group of human beings in world history.

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About Me

I became involved in SPUC after graduating, when I established a branch in south London in 1974. I have worked full-time for SPUC for 42 years. I became chief executive of SPUC in the UK in 1996, having been general secretary since 1978. I was elected vice-president of International Right to Life Federation in 2005. At UN conferences in Cairo, Copenhagen, Beijing, Istanbul and Rome, I helped coordinate more than 150 pro-life/pro-family groups resulting in pro-life victories in Cairo, Istanbul and Rome. I was educated at Salesian College, London, before going to Oxford where I graduated in English Language and Literature. I qualified as a teacher, becoming head of English at a secondary school. I am married to Josephine. We have a grown-up family and we live in north London.