§ Mr. Bryan Gould (Southampton, Test)With your permission, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and that of the House, I beg leave to present a petition on behalf of 1,500 signatories from Southampton and the surrounding area. The petitioners are concerned that the Abortion (Amendment) Bill will restrict the availability of abortion and will therefore take away what they describe as a woman's essential right to avoid an accidental and unwanted pregnancy.
They are particularly concerned that this will penalise women on low incomes unable to afford a private abortion:
Wherefore your petitioners pray that no legislation be passed which would restrict the circumstances in which women can have legal abortions, believing that women should have the right to free National Health Service abortions, and that restrictions will lead to enforced pregnancies and motherhood, unwanted children or dangerous back street abortions.
§ I beg leave to present the petition.
§ To lie upon the Table.
1845§ Mr. Stan Thorne (Preston, South)With your permission, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and that of the House, I beg leave to present a petition which, purely coincidentally, is on the same subject.
I believe it is the customary practice to indicate the size of the petition. I have not counted the signatures accurately but it is a smaller petition than that presented by my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test (Mr. Gould). It is the result of the work of the Preston Women's Association. The main gist of the petition is:
Wherefore your petitioners pray that no legislation be passed which would restrict the circumstances in which women can have legal abortions, believing that women should have the right to free National Health Service abortions, and that restrictions will lead to enforced pregnancies and motherhood, unwanted children or dangerous backstreet abortions.
§ To lie upon the Table.