2018 Irish 8th Amendment (Abortion) Referendum

[sinngael]

To take a hypothetical, if Northern Ireland were part of the Republic of Ireland, would that hurt or help efforts to repeal the abortion law?    

It's very hard to say, given that we don't even know how ROI will vote, and turnout in NI can also vary by issue. The historical facts are that as part of a larger state, with occasional pressure from a minority in Westminster to harmonise abortion law to the rest of the UK, NI has retained the same prohibition-in-practice as ROI, in part through anti-abortion agitation and community pressure against abortion clinics to close them down. All the grand sociological facts about different demographics don't matter here: the DUP and SDLP in particular are strongly pro-life, whereas in Alliance and the UUP it's a matter for legislator conscience, while SF naturally agrees with whatever the leadership says or they quit the party.

Would the SDLP really be strongly pro life? I thought their middle class vote would be fairly Liberal in social questions.

[sinngael]

Looking like my home constituency of Donegal is voting No, 52% at the moment, annoying but not unexpected, Lots of emigration in the last decade from this county so a much older age demographic than others, plus Donegal always seems to buck the national trend

[sinngael]

Galway East is the first reporting constituency. 60-40 yes. Does not strike me as a particularly liberal area as it only voted 53-47 for marriage equality

Back in the 1983 referendum on abortion it voted 80% in favour of the 8th amendment so quite a turnaround

[sinngael]

Dublin central to declare next I believe so it should be interesting to see how high its vote goes

[sinngael]

Dublin central in, 76% in favour of repeal