News Roundup

Big rise in same-sex divorces in England and Wales

The number of divorces among same-sex couples rose by over 40 percent in England and Wales in 2020 despite an overall decrease in courts dissolving marriages of 4.5%.

The latest figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) show in 2020, there were 1,154 divorces among same-sex couples, increasing by 40.4% from 2019.

Of these, the majority continued to be accounted for by female same-sex divorces (71.3%).

There were 102,438 opposite-sex divorces in 2020, decreasing by 4.8% from 107,599 in 2019.

For same-sex divorces, ‘unreasonable behaviour’ was the most common reason for divorce in 2020 for both female and male couples; unreasonable behaviour accounted for 55.2% of female divorces and 57.0% of male divorces.

In 2020, the average (median) duration of marriage at the time of divorce was 11.9 years for opposite-sex couples, a decrease from 12.4 years in 2019.

For same-sex divorces in 2020, the average (median) duration of marriage at the time of divorce was 4.7 years for female couples and 5.4 years for male couples. Divorces among same-sex couples have only been possible since 2015 following the introduction of same-sex marriages in March 2014.

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German court rejects access to euthanasia drugs for chronically ill

A court in the German city of Münster has ruled that seriously, as distinct from terminally ill people do not have the right to acquire lethal drugs that would enable them to kill themselves.

The decision was the result of a case in which three chronically ill people requested special permission from the Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArM) to be allowed to buy the drugs needed to die by suicide.

The regional higher administrative court said the institute was not “obliged to allow seriously ill people who have decided to commit suicide the purchase” of lethal drugs for this purpose.

The ruling added that it is up to a democratically elected government to change the law on acquiring lethal drugs, but that in the meantime such a practice would remain illegal.

BfArM, with its headquarters in the western city of Bonn, has so far rejected 225 requests for suicide-assisting medication, according to Catholic news agency KNA.

Germany’s Constitutional Court overturned a law two years ago that had outlawed assisting those seeking to kill themselves However, a law permitting assisted suicide for the terminally ill has not yet been passed by parliament.

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Egyptian Christian sentenced to five years in prison for blasphemy

A Cairo court sentenced a Coptic Christian citizen this week to five years in prison over blasphemy, among other related charges, according to a statement released by the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR).

Marco Gerges was found guilty of ‘misusing religion in promoting extremist thoughts, contempt of Islamic religion, and violating family values’, the statement added.

Gerges had been arrested in June 2021 for having improper images on his mobile phone that were considered to be offensive to Islam.

A source at EIPR said that Gerges is merely an ordinary citizen with no affiliation to any entity.

State security prosecution subsequently interrogated Gerges over his relationships and other personal matters; and he was faced with charges of slandering Islam on social media, which he denied, according to EIPR.

“The verdict against Gerges is one of a series of prosecutions as well as persecutions of citizens within the context of restricting freedom of expression…resorting to unconstitutional and overbroad laws such as blasphemy or that of the violation of family and social values,” EIPR noted in its statement.

“Such [approaches] open the door for misusing these accusations in breaching freedom of expression and thought, belief and creativity,” the statement concluded.

Christians in Egypt represent the biggest minority rated about 10 percent of the total population of about 101 million.

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Minister accused of ‘dishonesty’ in Abortion Review Chair appointment

Senator Ronan Mullen has attacked the Health Minister Stephen Donnelly alleging an opaque and misleading process of appointing a Chair to review the operation of the Abortion Act.

Speaking in the Seanad yesterday, the Independent NUI Senator said there was meant to be an open tendering process to find an Independent Chair. However, it has since emerged that there was no open tender; the Minister invited a few candidates to apply.

“What they are trying to do is to cover their tracks afterwards by claiming what they meant by tender was this secret process of contacting a small number of suitable candidates. For all we know now they were actually looking for a crony or somebody who actually was, if you like, on the abortion side of the argument because we have had no honesty and no reassurance,” he said.

“They say that they were going to tender openly and they do not do it. They tender secretly and they never tell us that they are going to do that. Then they change a press release but they do not alert the media to the fact that they have done so. It is nothing but dishonesty, I am afraid. It is an apology that they owe us, and it is not the Minister of State who should have been asked to come in and answer this today”.

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Ontario euthanasia deaths increase by more than 30% in 2021

There were 3102 assisted-suicide deaths in Ontario, Canada last year, up from 2378 in 2020, representing more than a 30% increase.

The data from the Office of the Chief Coroner of Ontario indicates that the December 2021 figures showed a significant increase with 298 reported euthanasia deaths as compared to 188 reported euthanasia deaths in December 2020.

A further analysis indicates that the growth in killing by lethal injection is getting worse, according to Alex Schadenberg, Executive Director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition. He says in the first half of 2021 there were 1363 assisted suicides, up from 1127 in the first half of 2020 or a 21% increase, but in the second half of 2021 there were 1739 assisted suicides up from 1251 in the second half of 2020 which is a 39% increase.

The 2020 Canadian euthanasia report indicated that the number of reported assisted suicides across all of Canada increased by 34% in 2020 to 7595 up from 5,660 in 2019 which was up more than 26% from 4,478 in 2018. Euthanasia deaths represented 2.5% of all Canadian deaths in 2020.

Since the federal government has not released data, based on the Ontario data, Schadenberg predicts “that there were almost 10,000 Canadian euthanasia deaths in 2021 and there have been approximately 31,000 Canadian euthanasia deaths from legalisation to December 31, 2021”.

He adds: “Some would suggest that this indicates that the killing program is successful, but rather I suggest that Canada is normalising killing and our healthcare system is abandoning people to death”.

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Men play large role in women’s abortion decision, study finds

Men play a critical role in determining whether a woman chooses to have an abortion, according to a survey released last week.

“You can’t be serious about ending abortion unless you are serious about engaging men on the issue,” said Roland Warren, president and CEO of Care Net, a US network of Christian crisis-pregnancy centres.

Care Net released the finding of a Feb. 25-March 26, 2021, survey of 1,000 American men whose spouse or partner had had an abortion. Findings show that roughly 3 out of every 4 men, or 74%, said their partner talked with them about getting the abortion before going through with it.

Forty-two percent of the men surveyed said they either “strongly urged” or “suggested” their partner have an abortion when they learned the woman was pregnant. An additional 31% say they did not give their partner any advice one way or the other.

Among the men surveyed who remained silent about the abortion decision, 63% said they thought it was “her choice” to make, and 61% said they were “ready to support her either way.” Nearly 20 out of every 100 men said they “didn’t feel they could say anything.”

The study found that 38% of men whose partner had an abortion think they were the “most influential on her decision.”

The data also reveals that “men play a key role in breaking the cycle of abortion and building strong families,” Warren said.

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Figures reveal only small minority of GPs facilitate abortion

Less than one in nine GPs are administering medical abortions, while just over half of the country’s maternity units carry out surgical terminations, over three years after they became legal here.

Since January 2019, abortions have been allowed for any reason during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, which is when the vast majority of terminations took place.

For the first nine weeks, they are allowed in GP surgeries.

According to Freedom of Information (FOI) figures released to Newstalk, only 405 GPs provide them.

There are about 3,500 GPs across the country – meaning over 88% do not.

Peigin Doyle from Sligo Action for ‘Reproductive Rights Access’ admits no Sligo GP has signed up for the HSE MyOptions website to provide medical abortions in that county.

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Amendment on assisted suicide withdrawn in UK parliament

An amendment that would have introduced assisted suicide into the text of a healthcare bill was withdrawn in the House of Lords yesterday.

Several peers from across the political spectrum opposed the amendment, which would have forced the government to submit an “assisted suicide” bill to Parliament within a year of the passage of the Health and Care Bill.

Lord Daniel Michael Gerald Moylan challenged the motion stating, “[…] the idea that we can impose on the government something it doesn’t want to do, for which it has no electoral mandate and which is not on its policy platform, seems like an abuse.”

Other peers noted the relationship between assisted suicide and palliative care is always inversely proportional.

Lord Robert Thomas William McCrea, of the Democratic Unionist Party, added during the debate in the Upper House that “[…] an assisted suicide bill, however well intended, would alter society’s attitude toward the elderly, the seriously ill, and the disabled, sending the message that assisted suicide is an option they should consider.”

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Child rapporteur backs facilitating commercial surrogacy

Children born to surrogates suffer from a “legislative vacuum” in Ireland, the government’s special rapporteur on child protection has told politicians today.

New rules proposed by the Department of Health will provide stronger regulation but only for domestic, non-commercial surrogacy. Most European countries ban commercial surrogacy outright on the basis that it commodifies children and exploits low-income women.

Conor O’Mahony, the government’s special rapporteur on child protection and a law professor at University College Cork, told the joint committee on children and youth that there is a legal limbo for children born through commercial surrogacy abroad.

“Even if domestic surrogacy is regulated, there will always be families who will opt for international arrangements, whether due to the availability of surrogates or other issues. It is unsustainable to allow these families to remain in the legal twilight zone they currently inhabit,” he is expected to say today.

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Committee to examine Bill on axing school places for children of past pupils

A Bill to remove entirely the automatic right of entry for children or grandchildren of past pupils is being considered by the Oireachtas Committee on Education today. The Joint Managerial Body (JMB) secretariat, which represents more than 400 voluntary schools, defends the practice. It says that it “arose from a concern for continuity of family experience and for the primacy of parental choice as protected in the Constitution”.

Drafted by Labour education spokesman Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, the proposed Bill would amend legislation introduced in 2018 that limited to 25 per cent of the first-year intake the number of such places.

Mr Ó Ríordáin said the Bill, which has not been opposed by the Government to date, would remove what he calls an “elitist” piece of legislation included, he argued, solely at the behest of certain influential fee-paying schools.

“This is a deliberate attempt to keep the royal bloodlines of succession through particular elite second-level schools, and it was done at the behest of those elitist second-level schools,” he said on Monday.

The JMB counters: “Schools, like families, are not solely operational entities; they thrive on relationships, values, continuity, local community cohesion and loyalties built up over time and, indeed, over generations,” it says.

The submissions suggest that the numbers of schools which operate the parent and grandparent rule is a small minority, and the criterion is usually below that of catchment area, feeder schools and the sibling rule.

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