Since a court in Northern Ireland ruled that a near total ban on abortion there is in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights concerning women who are pregnant with fatal foetal abnormalities or pregnant as the result of sexual crime - that is, rape - a number of highly courageous women have come forward and publicly told their heart-breaking stories. These involve having to travel to the UK for an abortion, after being told that their much loved and longed for baby had no chance of survival outside the womb.

The Taoiseach's response to this has been to promise a citizens' convention on the eighth amendment, should Fine Gael be re-elected. He has indicated that when a legislative framework comes before the Dáil, he will permit Deputies a free vote on the issue.

Ahead of the upcoming election, public emotion is running high on this issue. Yet it was running equally high when the Whip was exercised on both Deputy Clare Daly's and Deputy Ruth Coppinger's proposals to legislate for abortion. On that occasion, one of the most emotive speeches in the Dáil was given by Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett who has known the effects of fatal foetal abnormality. It is an awful shame that we did not take note of that opinion. If so, we would not have eight to ten women leaving for the UK this week to have an abortion. I will tell a story about that in a few minutes.

There is an umbrella group representing 40 organisations in Ireland and I have spoken to many of its representatives in recent weeks. They include the National Women's Council of Ireland, pro-choice groups, trade unions, and human rights organisations, such as Amnesty International and the Irish Council for Civil Liberties. They are now asking every candidate to state their position on this issue.

I am aware that this issue is a divisive one in the Taoiseach's party, not to mention across the country. However, it is now widely acknowledged that we need to put aside our emotions and adopt an evidence-based approach to this debate. The evidence is that Article 40.3.3o does not stop Irish abortions, it merely exports our problem.

In the interests of accountability, will the Taoiseach instruct each candidate in his party - whom he has said he is confident will be elected to form the next Government - to publicly state their position on repealing the eighth amendment? Would the Taoiseach agree that voters are entitled to know exactly where candidates stand on the issue before casting their vote? Because of the party whip system they have been prevented from doing so in the 31st Dáil.

The outcome of the 2016 election is not known and obviously will not be known until the people have cast their votes. I am not going to be in any way presumptuous about the outcome of that, nor should I be. I have given my view in respect of this-----

You could have had it in November.

Stay quiet, would you?

-----matter, which has been the source of very bitter and divisive debate on many occasions over the past 30 years or more in this country. The eighth amendment is obviously the case in point here. I have always said that I am opposed to abortion on demand. I do understand, in so far as I can, the difficulties that many people have faced because of a variety of circumstances. What I have committed to is that if this party is returned to government, I will set up a citizens' assembly within six months, composed properly of a fair regional and gender spread, to look at the question of the eighth amendment.

A citizens' assembly. You are in one.

That will be followed by analysis by an appropriate Oireachtas committee. If, out of that process, taking into account the comprehensive and sensitive analysis, there is a set of options to be considered that comes to this House, Members of this party will have a free vote on that.

Everybody understands the eighth amendment was put into the Constitution by the people and can only be changed or amended by the people. That does require sensitive, considered, careful and comprehensive discussion. That is what I have committed to and that is what I will stand by.

On 29 November, a 32 year old woman called Anna Marie left Waterford, driving alone to Dublin and then flying to London. There she was picked up by a mini-bus with eight other women in the vehicle. She told me that the eight others were all aged 17 to 19, some of whom were vomiting and weeping. She said that what frightened her most was the silence on that mini-bus as they were taken to the clinic, where nobody spoke, as well as the isolation and the loneliness. By the way, they had to make the same journey all the way back home and she had to drive down to Waterford. The woman is in a terrible state. She was to be here today, but I am not too sure if she is.

I believe the Taoiseach to be a man of compassion and I have never said otherwise. Would he allow this to happen to his own daughter? I do not know if he has a daughter. Would anybody here in the Dáil allow it to happen? Would the Taoiseach like to see his own daughter, in the emptiness and loneliness of a terribly frightening situation, having to leave her own country? I have three daughters and I would not like to see any of them having to go.

Very many young women do not tell their parents or friends - they go on their own. It is not the procedure that does the psychological damage to them. Believe it or not, all the indications are that it is the fact of having to make that journey on their own that does so. None of us should be sitting comfortably knowing that today a mini-bus is leaving Glasgow or London to take nine or ten such women to clinics, some of them as young as 17 or 18.

We are way over the time.

They are without family, friends or partners. Knowing that we have exported this problem over to England, I think it is inhuman. I would ask the Taoiseach to reconsider this position, particularly concerning people with fatal foetal abnormalities, or women who have been violently sexually assaulted and raped. This is an issue of compassion. We cannot continue to be inhuman in dealing with our citizens and exporting the problem.

I read the story that Deputy Halligan has referred to. It is one of many where these circumstances cause great stress and difficulty for so many people. That is why I believe we should have a respectful, rational and sensitive discussion involving the people, about their views and the options that they would consider as to what might be done.

I also recall watching a television programme recently about a woman who was given two opinions that the child she was to give birth to would not survive with a fatal foetal abnormality, which was not the case. These matters are all part of life.

I have committed to what I think we can do in a respectful and rational way about this. At the end of that process, a decision comes to this Chamber which will be a matter for the make-up of the next Government. Members of the party I lead will have the right to have a free vote in respect of their view on it. I thank the Deputy for raising it in the way he did. I feel we need to look at this in 2016 in a rational, respectful, sincere and sensitive way, and that is what I commit to.