As my cousin knows, I will always give way to her on other matters in these important debates, but seeing the look of consternation on the face of Mr Deputy Speaker, I fear that if I were to go into a separate analysis of our policy and how we would implement it and put in place a common assembly sometime in the future, he may call me to order. I would happily debate that point with the hon. Lady if she were to raise it at a later stage. I would do so even if she were to bring forward an Adjournment debate on the subject. I look forward to debating that issue.
The point that I did leave out in the hope that my colleague, the hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon), was going to intervene on me was this issue of bad law. I know that no one in this House—whether it is the hon. Member for Walthamstow or any other Member—wants to put in place bad laws, but sometimes the consequences of actions that we take lead to very bad laws. It may not be the intention, but it can ultimately be the impact. Certainly, the intention of some of the amendments that have been tabled would, in my view, really compromise matters relating to the sensitive issue of abortion rights. For example, they could lead to sex
selection abortions in Northern Ireland, and they could lead to a massive increase in the number of abortions of disabled life. We could see problems arise where there is no proper management or scrutiny of where abortions take place. All these issues have been flagged up by a number of groups that have been looking at the problems that would arise if a quick solution were found, which does not exist, to a very difficult set of circumstances that pertain in Northern Ireland. We need to tread cautiously on this issue and not just think about brushing away some pieces of law and some protections that we have, because suddenly everything will be open to change, and that could be very detrimental indeed. The changes could also have an impact in England and Wales: if we were to create a set of circumstances where the laws in Northern Ireland would be so open to abortion, basically anything could go. We would then have a set of circumstances in which Northern Ireland would be well out of kilter on this issue with the Republic of Ireland where I understand that abortion will be limited to the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. We would have a situation where it could be right up to the point of birth in Northern Ireland. That would be absolutely terrible and something that is clearly not the desire or the intention.