§ 11.33 p.m.
§ Mr. Ian Campbell (Dunbartonshire, West)I have great pleasure in presenting this petition tonight on behalf of the Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child. This society was supported by many other similar organisations when it sought the support of women of the age of 16 years and over and in fact obtained more than 425,000 signatures in its efforts. Those signatures were obtained mainly from ordinary women who know the problems of raising children and who feel strongly enough about the way the Abortion Act is working to have been prepared to sign a petition asserting the basic statement:
That abortion destroys human life …That it negates the Declaration on the Rights of the Child adopted by the United Nations on 20th November, 1959, which states that children are entitled to appropriate legal protection before as well as after birthThat the majority of women in this country repudiate the elitist minority calling for abortion on demand who claim to speak for womenWherefore your Petitioners pray that the House of Commons should pass legislation to 1301 limit abortion and instead institute programmes which will provide justice for women under pressure and which will include those recommendations put forward in the Finer Committee Report to assist single-parent families.
§ Petition to lie upon the Table.