ISSUES
: Abortion
Chapter 2: Abortion debate
31
“criminalises women”. The truth is
that the amendment does not even
apply to women. Rather, it relates
to those who apply the grounds of
the 1967 Abortion Act – a privilege
granted only to doctors.
Another criticism is that this
amendment will prevent a woman
from accessing abortion where
there is a gender-linked disability in
the child. This also is wrong.
Currently, doctors can and do
conclude that a foetus is at risk of
being disabled by establishing the
gender of the baby. In certain cases,
this may provide a legal justification
for abortion.
However, these abortions are not
undertaken on the “grounds of the
sex of the unborn child”. Rather
they are undertaken because there
is a “substantial risk that the child,
if born, would suffer from such
physical or mental abnormalities as
to be seriously handicapped”, as
the rather outdated language of the
Abortion Act has it.
It is very easy to be drawn into a
technical discussion about the
law and to forget the reality that
this amendment seeks to address.
There are women in the United
Kingdom who are opting to have
gender-selective abortions. If we
think that this is in the public interest
then we should bring in a new law
and sweep away the protections for
the unborn child in the 1967 act and
accept that there is an entitlement
to gender selection by abortion. But
we should not allow the present law
to limp on in this state any longer.
For these reasons, I would urge all
colleagues in the House to support
the amendment today.
* Dominic Grieve MP, was Attorney
General from 2010–2014.
23 February 2015
Ö
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Limited 2016
Why I oppose a ban on
sex-selection abortion
An article from
The Conversation
.
By Pam Lowe, Senior Lecturer in
Sociology, Aston University
A
campaign is underway in the
UK to make it illegal to abort
a child based on its gender.
Proponents say they are worried
about women being coerced into
terminating female foetuses and
that action needs to be taken to
stop discrimination against baby
girls.
But this is a flawed argument. You
cannot promote gender equality by
enacting laws that place restrictions
on women’s bodies. Banning sex-
selective abortion opens up a world
in which there is such thing as a
“good” and “bad” reason for an
abortion. What’s more, it implies
coercion is a reproductive health
issue rather than what it actually is
– an act of domestic violence.
The truth about abortion
law
The campaign to ban sex-selective
abortions is currently focused on
getting an amendment into the
Serious Crime Bill. Conservative
MP Fiona Bruce has tabled an
amendment to the bill which has
the support of more than 70 other
members of parliament who want to
see it fast tracked into legislation in
the next few months.
Contrary to popular belief, abortion
is still a crime in the UK. The
1967 Abortion Act did not repeal
earlier legislation that criminalised
abortion. It does not give women
the legal right to an abortion.
Instead it provides a legal defence
for the crime of abortion if the
conditions of the act are met. Within
the act, abortion was framed as a
health issue and the legal defence
of abortion is based on the health
implications of pregnancy for both
the woman and foetus.
So, for example, abortion will
comply with the act if, in the
clinical judgement of two doctors,
continuing the pregnancy will pose
a greater risk to a woman’s physical
and mental health than if she
terminated.
The act does not list any specific
reasons, such as rape, where this
might be the case. It therefore
avoids setting up a list dictating
the circumstances under which an
abortion is “good” or “bad”.
Categorisingabortionby acceptable
or unacceptable reasons needs to
be avoided. As the evidence from
elsewhere shows this can lead
to simplistic judgements about
women’s lives and behaviour. It
might be agreed that being raped
is a “good” reason for abortion, for
example, but then there would need
to be a mechanism to prove a rape
took place.
Making abortion a health issue
in the law also means that the
decision is a matter between
women and doctors. The views
of their partners or wider families
cannot be considered. Introducing
a specific ban on sex-selection
abortion will change this. Doctors
would have to investigate family
life in order to rule out this motive,
eroding women’s privacy. This
is not progress towards ending
discrimination against women.
Restricting abortion
The main force behind the campaign
to ban sex-selection abortion are
members of the Pro-Life All-Party
Parliamentary Group – of which
Bruce is the chairwoman. Like all
anti-abortion groups, its mission
is to end abortion, not to promote
women’s rights. In the UK, the
majority of the population supports
legal abortion, so rather than
directly challenge abortion, pro-
life groups seek alternative ways to
restrict it.
