It is almost make-your-mind-up time for Fianna Fail and PDs

After three years of political bobbing and weaving on the abortion issue, involving a Government Green Paper and a report by an all-party Dail committee, it is almost make-your-mind-up time for Fianna Fail and the Progressive Democrats. But not yet, dear God, not yet.

The Taoiseach is still crouched in the long grass, unwilling to commit himself to a specific referendum wording or a course of action. But he has been making positive noises in response to demands by Mildred Fox, Harry Blaney, Jackie Healy-Rae and Tom Gildea for a referendum. And, at the same time, he has been trying to keep Mary Harney sweet in Government. It's a tough station.

Facing a number of directions at the same time is something Mr Ahern has skilfully managed in the past. But time eventually closes off options. And we are heading towards an endgame on the abortion issue, having travelled in a huge, elliptical orbit. It has been a fascinating process of positioning and prevarication.

Fianna Fail figured that the missing element from the 1992 referendum, which failed to roll back the X case, was the involvement of the medical profession. So it set about involving doctors, gynaecologists and obstetricians in laying down the law, educating anti-abortionists and in deciding what was constitutionally permissible.

The approach might effectively grant the medical profession and its council the powers of the Oireachtas and the Supreme Court. But what the hell, the end justified the means.

The problems involved in this approach became apparent when some medical specialists disagreed before the committee about the use of certain procedures that led to the death of the foetus. And the situation became even more complicated when the various churches got in on the act and disagreed on what was ultimately permissible.

In spite of that, Brian Lenihan and his men muddled on. They proposed that legislation should be enacted to protect "existing medical practice" and that it should restate the criminal prohibition on abortion. In doing so, it accepted that the ethical principle of direct and indirect abortions, which underpins general medical treatment in Ireland, was unsafe to use in legal terminology. And it ruled out social, psychological or psychiatric grounds (including suicide) as grounds for termination.

After all that, they suggested that certain medical procedures could be withheld in private hospitals because doctors would only be able to defend themselves against charges of abortion involving them in public hospitals. It was a mess. And it is likely to get worse. "Existing medical practice" changes with time. What is repudiated or procedurally impossible today may alter tomorrow. We may be deepening the hole that was first dug in 1983.

The committee's report will now go to the Cabinet subcommittee for consideration. And Liz O'Donnell of the Progressive Democrats is unlikely to break her neck in giving the Fianna Fail a green light to proceed. If the subcommittee directs Michael McDowell to begin the process of drafting legislation and a constitutional referendum, the changes will almost certainly require the approval of the Medical Council. And that will involve toing and froing and inevitable delay.

Even then, there is no certainty such a package will get through the Dail. Mary Harney has said she is opposed to a divisive referendum. And while the party may not seek to bring down the Government on the issue, she has promised the Progressive Democrats a free vote. A failure at that stage would put the pressure back on the Independents. Five years ago, Bertie Ahern led Fianna Fail through the Dail lobbies in opposing legislation that gave women the right to travel abroad and to avail of information on abortion. It was an extraordinary development, given that two-thirds of the electorate had voted in favour of such rights in a series of referendums in 1992. But Fianna Fail was looking towards a well organised and vociferous constituency. The antiabortion lobby had captured 35 per cent of the popular vote in 1992 and was looking for a new referendum. As an indication of his intentions, Mr Ahern set up a Fianna Fail committee to examine the issue. And, by the time the general election came around in 1997, he targeted that bloc of votes and promised a new abortion referendum to readers of the Irish Catholic.

In Government, Mr Ahern looked at the five recommendations produced by the Fianna Fail expert committee and appointed a Cabinet subcommittee to produce a Green Paper. Last year, that subcommittee expanded the five options to seven and the hot potato was passed to Mr Lenihan's all-party Oireachtas Committee.

Yesterday, after 14 months' deliberation, the three major parties failed to agree and reversed into the positions they had taken during the campaign on the abortion referendum in 1992.

The difference is that, on this occasion, Fianna Fail hopes to have the anti-abortion groups on board. By using the medical profession to explain there can be no such thing as a total ban on abortion, Mr Ahern aims to carry the day and remove suicide as grounds for termination.

If that happens, Irish women will be provided with information and allowed to travel to Britain for an abortion. On their return, they will be provided by the State with post-abortion counselling and medical check-ups in an environment of "healing and comfort". But abortion will not be allowed here. The phrase "an Irish solution to an Irish problem" springs to mind.