Irish ex-pats are embracing the notion that every vote counts, as thousands of them – including many from Canada – are flying home to have their say in Ireland’s too-close-to-call referendum on abortion.
The referendum, which is slated for Friday, will decide the fate of Ireland’s Eighth Amendment outlawing nearly all forms of abortion. A “yes” result would open the door for new legislation permitting unrestricted abortion within the first 12 weeks, while a “no” would preserve a 35-year-old element of the constitution that the United Nations has called “cruel and inhumane.”
The fierce debate has divided a country with strong Roman Catholic roots, pitting friends, co-workers and family members against one another.
“It is splitting a nation,” Irish citizen Chris Coyle, 51, of Galway, told GlobalNews.ca on Thursday.
“Nobody knows how it’s going to go.”
Coyle’s daughter, 22-year-old Ciara, is one of the many Canadian residents on her way back to Ireland to vote “yes” in the referendum. Coyle says Ciara had to take time off from her finance job in Toronto to make the trip on Thursday, only to turn around and head back to Canada on another flight Saturday.
It will be Ciara’s first time coming home since Christmas.
“It’s a huge financial burden. It costs a little over $800 just for the flight,” Coyle said, adding that the trip will be approximately 13-14 hours from door to door. “But it’s worth it,” he said. “She’s a young woman. She may need the services that are not currently available in this country, and she’s willing to do whatever it takes to have her voice heard.”
Coyle says Ciara was determined to come home to vote from the moment the referendum was announced back in March.
“I’m very proud of her and I support her decision 100 per cent,” he said.
Dozens of Irish emigrants in Canada have shared their stories online, with many pledging either to fly home for the vote, or to sponsor other emigrants who are eligible to do so.
Emma Jayne Geraghty, who works for Amnesty International Canada in Toronto, said she is going home to vote because she once had to leave the country to access abortion services in the U.K.
“The cost of my travel home from Toronto to vote for a woman’s right to choose is less than what I paid for when I was forced to travel to the U.K. to access an abortion,” she said in a blog post on Amnesty’s website.
“It’s really atrocious that in this day and age, women in Ireland are being forced to travel to access safe abortion services.”
P.E.I. resident Amy FitzGerald tweeted a photo of her flight itinerary, saying that the 15-hour trip for a brief two-day visit will be “worth it” to vote “yes.”
The #HomeToVote movement has swept through Ireland’s ex-pat community, prompting many to share their own travel itineraries from such countries as the United States, Vietnam, Italy and Australia.
The majority of #HomeToVote tweets have come from “yes” voters, but advocates for the “no” side have also used it to spread their message. Advocates for the “no” side have even secured the web address hometovote.uk, where they encourage visitors to defend the Eighth Amendment.
The #HomeToVote hashtag is said to have brought tens of thousands back to Ireland for a referendum on same-sex marriage in 2015. The Irish ultimately voted in favour of allowing same-sex marriage, with the “yes” side claiming 62 per cent of the vote. Voter turnout was 60.5 per cent in the nation of about 4.77 million people.
Friday’s referendum on abortion will be the first of its kind in three-and-a-half decades. It’ll also be the first time anyone under the age of 53 in Ireland has been allowed to vote on making abortion legal.
Polls close at 10 p.m., with results expected to be announced Saturday evening.