Big student majority favours right to choose

Date Published: 14-Mar-2013

BY CIARAN TIERNEY

Over 70% of students voted in favour of adopting a woman’s right to abortion as official Students Union (SU) policy in a referendum which took place at NUI Galway last week.

The poll, which coincided with the election of new SU officers for the coming academic year, will see the representative body adopt a ‘pro-choice’ policy for the coming year.

In what is understood to have been one of the highest turnouts for a SU election in years, 2,478 students voted in favour of a pro-choice stance, with 1,118 voting against, from a total poll of 3,596 voters.

The proposition will see the NUI Galway SU support the national campaign for full reproductive rights, including a woman’s right to abortion, as part of its policy for the coming year.

It calls on the SU to “use every available” measure to realise a woman’s right to abortion both on campus and at a national level.

Robin Potke of the NUIG Choice Society, who campaigned successfully for a yes vote, told the Galway City Tribune yesterday that the death of Savita Halappanavar in Galway last October had galvanised the students to press for a change in SU policy.

Ms Halappanavar (31) died at University Hospital Galway (UHG) a week after being admitted for back pain while she was 17 weeks pregnant.

Her death generated headlines all around the world and prompted renewed calls for legislation to allow legal terminations in Ireland, in order to prevent similar deaths from occurring in the future.

For more on this story, see the Galway City Tribune.