A member of ‘Be Here For Me’, a group that offers counselling to women entering abortion facilities, told members of the Oireachtas yesterday that she owes the life of her daughter to a pro-life person she met outside a Marie Stopes abortion clinic in Ealing, London.

Alina Dulgheriu was addressing a Human Dignity Group event on the Government’s plan to introduce ‘exclusion zones’ outside abortion facilities in Ireland. Deputy Carol Nolan, who chaired Wednesday’s meeting, said introducing exclusion zones in Ireland “would create a very dangerous precedent”. She said that buffer zones like the ones being proposed in Ireland do not exist throughout Europe and that “placing a bolt on every door to deny women the opportunity to access to information on alternatives to abortion is neither pro-woman nor pro-choice.”