Simon Harris has come under pressure from a prominent pro-choice TD and party colleague to amend his extreme abortion legislation to make it even more liberal.

Kate O’Connell TD has tabled amendments that would lift a requirement for women to be examined by a medical professional before they can have a termination. Ms O’Connell has also joined Sinn Féin and Solidarity-People Before Profit in calling for Mr Harris to scrap a rule that would mean the doctor who diagnoses a serious life-limiting condition and predicts a child is likely to die before or soon after birth has to be the same one who executes the abortion when requested by the parents on those grounds.

Meanwhile, Sinn Féin is calling for doctors to be referred to the medical council if they refuse to offer abortion services and refuse to refer the woman to a doctor who will. It also wants the government to drop the threat of prison for those who help women to have illegal abortions.

Sinn Féin and Solidarity-People Before Profit have called for women in Northern Ireland to be given access to free abortions in the Republic, and they want the state to cover the cost for women who travel from the North to do so.