UK Parliament partially decriminalizes abortion
The vote had come after an Englishwoman faced a years-long investigation and prosecution for self managing an abortion after receiving medication through telehealth.
The British Parliament voted to decriminalize abortion in its session on Tuesday, which means that women will no longer face criminal punishment for taking abortion medication.
Activists in the country had been pushing for changes since several women were investigated and prosecuted for taking abortion medications in a self-managed way. The bill does not change any other law regarding abortion. Women still require the approval of two doctors to undergo a procedure, and they can get one up to the 24th week of pregnancy. In the vote, 379 MPS were in favour of reforming it, and 137 went against.
The law that had existed dated back to 1861, when a ban prevented abortions altogether. In 1967, that law was liberalized, and it permitted abortions in certain situations. Between 1861 and 2018, there were only three prosecutions of women, though there were more for back-alley providers. But after 2018, there have been six. That has to do with women taking mifepristone and misoprostol.
The 1861 law is known as the Offenses Against the Persons Act, and it calls for life imprisonment for some people who perform abortions illegally. Another law passed in 1923 is the Infant Life Preservation Act. That prevents abortions past the point of viability.
Neither of those laws was repealed. But women who undergo an abortion can’t be prosecuted any longer.
Some aspects of British abortion jurisprudence's history are worth exploring. Historically, criminal abortion, much like in America, was done in back-alley settings. It wasn’t until the 1930s, with the formation of the Abortion Law Reform Association, that feminists and doctors began pushing for liberalization of the laws. At the time, some, like British birth control pioneer Marie Stopes, who is to England what Margaret Sanger is to America, hadn’t wanted to focus on abortion. But pioneering feminists like Stella Browne and Janet Chance did.
Their chance to bring the issue to national attention came in 1938 with the case of Rex v. Bourne. Dr. Aleck Bourne, an OB/GYN, performed an abortion on a 14-year-old rape victim. It arose from the brutal sexual assault of Nellie Hales, who lived in London with her parents, Horace and her mother, who was also named Nellie. Three royal guardsmen at the Horse Guards in London lured her into a stall where they raped her repeatedly. Afterward, her mother took her to a Catholic hospital where a doctor told them that he wouldn’t perform an abortion because the baby could be a future prime minister. English law called for adoption in situations where rape led to pregnancy.
Later, the mother wrote a letter to Joan Malleson, who worked at St. Mary’s Hospital and was a member of the Abortion Law Reform Association. In turn, she contacted Bourne, who agreed to perform an abortion. It went before a jury at Old Bailey, the most famous courthouse in the world. The jury acquitted him on the same day it deliberated. I adapted this for both a play and a screenplay.
That galvanized the abortion rights movement all over the world. And it’s what eventually led to the 1967 liberalization in England. The 1967 reforms led to English law permitting abortions when a continued pregnancy would cause significant harm to a woman’s well-being. It also can’t be past the 24th week.
Several key points are worth noting regarding the reforms introduced in the 1960s. They stipulated that the abortions had to be done in hospital settings or approved medical clinics. The design of that law was intended to ensure that women received the safest possible care and avoided entering dangerous, back-alley environments. It wasn’t designed with abortion medication in mind, much like the Supreme Court precedent after Roe.
That medical option didn’t arrive until the 1990s with RU-486. The laws in England are woefully behind the times insofar as addressing abortion care as it currently exists, with the majority of women opting for medication instead of surgical procedures.
When debating the issue, MP Tonia Antoniazzi discussed the case of Nicola Packer, a 45-year-old woman who recently faced life imprisonment for self-managing an abortion. Packer was acquitted. Antoniazzi also discussed several other cases that women had suffered under the law.
“Each one of these cases is a travesty enabled by our outdated abortion law. Although abortion is available in England and Wales under conditions set by the Abortion Act 1967, the law underpinning it, which dates back to 1861—the Offences Against the Person Act—means that outside those conditions, abortion remains a criminal offence carrying a maximum life sentence,” Antoniazzi said.
“Originally passed by an all-male Parliament elected by men alone, this Victorian law is increasingly used against vulnerable women and girls.”
Immediately after her remarks, MP Jim Allister of North Antrim argued for the rights of the fetus.
“Can the Hon. Lady advise us whether there is any other area of law governing the taking of life in which the guardrails of the criminal law have been removed?” Allister said to Antoniazzi. “That is what new clause 1 proposes when it comes to the voiceless child. Is there no thought of protection for them?”
Some of the remarks from MPs suggested crafting a bill that would prevent a situation like Packer’s from occurring by eliminating telemedicine as an option. In Nicola’s case, she had taken abortion medication at a later stage than it was prescribed for. She hadn’t realized she was that far along. Conservative MP Caroline Johnson, who is a pediatrician, supported having in-person consultations for women who want abortions so that they can determine the stage of pregnancy they are in. Johnson and other MPs heavily criticized abortions later in pregnancy, with terms like feticide being used interchangeably.
Johnson’s attempt to limit telemedicine abortion with an amendment was defeated.
Labour MP Stella Creasy argued for removing the abortion laws altogether. She doesn’t want the doctor to be prosecuted either in any situation. Creasy argued for even more expansive protections for providers and women in those situations. Allister got in a heated argument with her.
Creasy had also been harassed upon her entrance into Parliament before the debate.
“Members will have seen outside this place the modern anti-abortion movement that we now have in the UK, and will have received the scaremongering emails,” Creasy said on the debate floor. “Of course, those in that movement are reacting more strongly than ever to the idea of women having this human right protected in law, because their opposition is not about children. If it was, they would not shout at mine when they see them in the street. It is about controlling women.”
It will now head to the House of Lords, which can’t overturn the House of Commons. Then it will need the royal assent, which is merely a formality. In speaking to other activists in the country, they still intend to push for more protections for abortions later in pregnancy and for the doctors who prescribe medication or perform the procedure. I’ll have more as I speak to people involved in the coming days.