A Crime and Policing Bill that passed on March 18 in England’s House of Lords came with a clause that could change abortion law in the United Kingdom.
Since 1967, abortion has been legal in the UK up to 24 weeks of pregnancy. At one point an in-person medical visit was required before an abortion, but since the pandemic, that’s been waived. Women can be prescribed abortion pills in the mail after just a telemedicine phone call — known as “pills by post” — until 10 weeks of pregnancy.
Until now, it was illegal for a woman to attempt to induce an abortion outside of those defined guidelines — that is, with medical oversight and after 24 weeks, or after 10 weeks if at home. But the bill that passed the House of Lords March 18 may change that.
The bill included Clause 208:
Removal of women from the criminal law related to abortion: For the purposes of the law related to abortion… no offence is committed by a woman acting in relation to her own pregnancy.
In other words, it would remove criminal penalties for women in England and Wales who end their own pregnancy at any stage.
Criminal charges for women who seek abortions vary around the world. Some countries that outlaw abortion in certain circumstances (types of procedures or weeks of gestation, for example) focus on the abortion doctors performing the procedure, and not the women.
The bill is not yet law, as it will return to the House of Commons for any final changes and then must receive Royal Assent, but it's well on its way.
Pro-life leaders decry the change
Michael Robinson, Executive Director of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, said in a statement:
As we heard from many peers this evening, these profound changes to the Abortion Act are being pushed through without any pre-legislative scrutiny, public consultation or a detailed impact assessment. Therefore, those supporting these changes have done so based on ideology and without a proper understanding of their adverse effects…
Legalising abortion up to birth is the most radical extension of the Abortion Act since its introduction. This change will put the lives and mental health of women at risk. It will lead to late term abortions being carried out on babies who if born in hospital would stand a good chance of surviving.
It is profoundly disappointing that Lords have accepted abortion up to birth, rejecting other measures which looked to strengthen safeguards, ensuring doctors continue to play an integral part in the process and ensuring women have access to counselling following an abortion.
Other pro-life groups criticized the way that “pro-abortion MPs hijacked the Crime and Policing Bill to rush through the abortion up to birth clause after just 46 minutes of backbench debate” after “no prior consultation with the public, no Committee Stage scrutiny and no evidence sessions.”
Britons don’t want abortion up to birth
Polling has found that just one percent of Britons support abortion up to birth. And more than 1,000 medical professionals signed a letter to the House of Lords raising “grave concerns” about the change.
Former Health Minister Maria Caulfield spoke out against it, writing, “There is nothing progressive or modern about changing the law such that a viable baby can have its life ended beyond the legal time limit for abortion without any repercussions.”
Baroness Monckton of Dallington Forest was one of several peers who spoke out strongly against decriminalizing abortion up to birth, saying:
This is not pro- or anti-life. It is not extremist to want protections for viable babies, and it is not anti-women to say that coercion or dangerous self-medication should not be outside the reach of the law.
The Anglican Archbishop-designate of Canterbury, Sarah Mullally, spoke out against the clause too. She addressed the House of Lords before their vote, saying, "I cannot support Clause 208. Though its intention may not be to change the 24-week abortion limit, it undoubtedly risks eroding the safeguards and enforcement of those legal limits and inadvertently undermining the value of human life."
Abuse of “pills by post”
One of many concerns with this change is that it will reduce oversight of “pills by post” abortions — a system which some criminals have abused already.
A case that came up several times was that of Stuart Worby, a British man who used deception to obtain abortion pills through “pills by post” and used them to spike a woman’s drink, causing the death of her unborn baby against her will.
Philippa, Baroness Stroud, one of the peers who argued against Clause 208, said of the Worby case:
In-person consultations protect against coercion and abuse… He could not have obtained the pills if in-person appointments were still mandatory.
Stroud and other peers pushed to remove Clause 208 from the bill and to bring back in-person consultations with a medical professional before a woman can take abortion pills at home:
At this consultation, medical professionals would have the opportunity to accurately assess, in person, any likely health risks for a woman taking abortion pills, her gestational age and the possibility of a coerced abortion.
This would help protect women from the health risks involved with performing a late-term abortion… It would also protect babies from having their lives ended in late-term home abortions.
However, their efforts were unsuccessful.
Instead, the UK is now on the verge of seeing “the biggest change to abortion legislation since the Abortion Act was introduced in 1967.”
