Precious Life - a voice for the unborn child

!!! THIS CAMPAIGN ENDED 10 DECEMBER 2008 !!!

The final report of the Bill of Rights Forum, submitted to the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission on 31 March 2008, has denied any rights to unborn children and is, therefore, fundamentally flawed.

In April 2007, the Forum agreed that the first principle as the basis of its work was "...a Bill of Rights is needed to provide strong legal protection for human rights for all the people of Northern Ireland." However, their final report provides no human rights or legal protection for unborn children in Northern Ireland. This is sheer hypocrisy!

Their report states, "A child is a human being below the age of eighteen years..." and "...the Bill of Rights ... must draw on the principles and provisions contained in international human rights instruments, in particular the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child." This Convention — one of the most widely ratified human rights treaty in the world — states clearly that, before birth, a child deserves special safeguards, care and legal protection. But once again the Forum's hypocrisy was exposed when they rejected proposals to protect the rights of a human being before birth.

The report fails to reflect the particular circumstances and ethos of Northern Ireland. When a motion opposing abortion was debated in our Assembly in October 2007, Precious Life presented over 120,000 petitions against abortion signed by the people of Northern Ireland. That motion was passed with cross-party support. This is proof of the pro-life ethos in Northern Ireland that wants our unborn children protected.

The report also uses ambiguous words like "reproductive rights"; "the right to...reproductive health"; "the right to make decisions...concerning reproduction"; and "the right to...control over her...body." These undefined terms have been used in other countries around the world as code-language for legalising abortion.

The Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission will now use these recommendations to draw up the final draft of the Bill of Rights to be presented to the Secretary of State in December.

Abortion is the ultimate abuse of human rights. Every human being possesses the same basic rights and foremost amongst them is the right to life itself – for on that, all other rights depend. A Bill of Rights which does not recognise the right to life of every person, born and unborn, is worthless.

TAKE ACTION - Contact the Human Rights Commission. Tell them that the proposed Bill of Rights must ensure the human rights of unborn children are fully and firmly protected in law, policy and practice.

Select and Copy the following text ...

I want unborn babies and their mothers protected from abortion.
An unborn child must be afforded all human rights from the moment of conception.
Therefore, I want the new Bill of Rights for Northern Ireland to ensure that the human rights of unborn babies are fully and firmly protected in law, policy and practice.

...and paste it into the "Type your message here" box on the Human Rights Commission Website, then click on their 'Send Now' button.

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