A Government scheme to provide contraception free of charge could cost €100m and might not work, according to a new report.

The report of a working group, set up earlier this year by Health Minister Simon Harris in the wake of the liberalisation of abortion laws, said the notion there is a “sizeable” affordability challenge across the population in terms of accessing contraception remains unproven.

Simply making contraception free for users would not necessarily reduce the number of crisis pregnancies or help promote the uptake of more effective contraceptive methods, the group warns. There is a “very real risk” that removing the cost barrier would simply displace private expenditure and represent an “ineffective use of scarce resources” without actually modifying behaviour or improving health benefits, it notes.

Nonetheless, even a “relatively marginal improvement in access and contraception use” would have some health advantages in terms of avoiding the negative consequences of crisis pregnancies, it argues.

The working group also found contraception use in Ireland is “high and stable” and difficulty accessing contraception is a challenge only “at the margins in overall population terms”.