Abortion (Amendment) (Hansard, 17 December 1996)

§ Mr. David Amess (Basildon)

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend section 1(1) of the Abortion Act 1967 in relation to the grounds on which a pregnancy may be terminated. It is Christmas and the whole country seems to be immersed in preparations to celebrate that day. It is not a matter for conjecture—Christmas will be celebrated on 25 December and that is the day that the infant Jesus was born. There was an interesting editorial in the Sunday Express this weekend that posed the question of how many people actually think about the real purpose behind the celebration of Christmas. In the same newspaper, there was another excellent article by Mr. Enoch Powell about the issues that are debated in Parliament these days and the nature of our debates. I had the privilege to be present in the Chamber when Enoch Powell moved a similar Bill and I can only lament that, for various reasons, we no longer have such profound debates on fundamental issues. This is the perfect time for the House to spend a little while considering the plight of babies who are never allowed to develop and be born. I refer to abortion.

The House is familiar with the arguments deployed in support of the Abortion Act 1967 when it was originally introduced. The intentions of the Act were clear at the time. My Bill would support that Act in spirit and in practice. Those who support abortion per se explain their views by saying that a woman has a right to choose and they ask what the state does with unwanted babies. Last year, 163,621 abortions were carried out in England and Wales. Did every one of those women choose not to conceive a child? Is it really possible that so many women had abortions because the risk of injury to the physical or mental health of the mother or existing children was greater than if the pregnancies were terminated? To me, that seems beyond comprehension.

The current clinical interpretation of the Abortion Act 1967, in effect, means that any woman can have a termination if she wishes as long as gestation is under 24 weeks. That fact was highlighted in the summer when a healthy twin was aborted for purely social reasons and a senior gynaecologist admitted on BBC Radio 4: There is abortion on demand … if a woman wants an abortion, she gets one". Aborting any foetus is contrary to the original intentions of the Abortion Act of some 30 years ago, which was passed to allow abortions only in a restricted number of cases. Furthermore, with increasing evidence of the humanity of the foetus, those abortions raise serious moral and ethical issues.

Section 1(1)(a) of the Abortion Act 1967 provides no yardstick, thus allowing abortion on demand, sometimes quite late in a pregnancy as we saw with the twin who was killed after 16 weeks. In 1979, Sir Ian Percival, then the Solicitor-General, told a Standing Committee that was considering tightening the grounds for abortion that there was bound to be some risk in every continuing pregnancy, which makes nonsense of the law as it stands at present. He was discussing the inclusion of the word "substantially" before the phrase greater than if the pregnancy were terminated in order to make the test more stringent and more than merely a statistical evaluation.

777 While the Bill would be only a small improvement, we are still left with the words "risk" and "injury", neither of which are quantified. Having a stitch or two in the cervix could be regarded by some doctors as an injury, but it would hardly justify the killing of the child in the womb. We therefore need to make it clear that both the risk and the injury must be serious.

Evidence is emerging of the long-term damage caused by abortion, not the least of which is the possibility of breast cancer following abortion. Current figures show a 30 per cent. increase in the incidence of breast cancer among women who have had abortions. There is also evidence from all over the world of women suffering years of trauma as a result of abortions that they imagined would be simple procedures and the answer to an immediate problem. Only this month, the British Medical Journal carried a paper on suicide after pregnancy in Finland from 1987 to 1994. The general suicide rate in Finland for that period was 11.3 per 100,000 and the rate associated with birth was significantly lower at 5.9. However, the suicide rate associated with miscarriage was 18.1 and it soared to 34.7 for induced abortion—significantly higher than in the population at large.

Some years ago, Westminster hospital published a research paper about attempted suicides among teenagers in its catchment area. The only significant statistic to emerge was that the suicide rate was seven times greater among girls who had had abortions compared with the control group. That figure increased to nine times greater when compared with teenage girls in the population at large. The research was decried on the ground that it was statistically too small, but I have heard of no follow-up investigation. In 1992, a short-term study published in the British Journal of Psychiatry found that 10 per cent. of women undergoing abortions suffered from psychological damage or trauma.

My Bill would not alter those sections of the Act that allow abortions in order to save the mother's life. It would not alter the sections dealing with grave and permanent injury to the mother or with the handicapped. It would tighten that part of the Act, section 1(1)(a), under which 97 per cent. of abortions are carried out. It would state quite simply that an abortion would be granted only if there was a significant risk to the mother of serious injury and if that risk was substantially greater than the risks inherent in every pregnancy. It would see an end to abortion on demand—which was never the intention of the 1967 Act. It would do what the present laws are meant to do but what they singularly fail to do: protect the woman and the child. I commend the Bill to the House.

§ Mrs. Anne Campbell (Cambridge)

I rise to oppose the Bill. Abortion is an issue about which many people feel strongly—and it is not difficult to understand why. Some hon. Members hold particularly strong views on the subject and have declared their intention to use every opportunity to raise the issue on the Floor of the House. It is their right to do so, but they should appreciate—and we should remember—that, although they are very vocal, they represent a view that is held by a very small minority.

778 When a Sunday newspaper commissioned a MORI opinion poll following the controversy about abortions that occurred this summer, it found that 81 per cent. of respondents agreed or tended to agree with the statement: It is important for pregnant women to have the right to choose whether or not to continue their pregnancy". Only 10 per cent. disagreed or tended to disagree and 9 per cent. neither agreed nor disagreed or had no opinion on the matter. The great majority of people in this country accept that abortion is regrettable but sometimes necessary.

Perhaps most people feel that way because they are sympathetic to the plight of women with problem pregnancies and they have some sense of what it might mean to force a woman to bear a child when she believes, and her doctors agree, that she could not cope. It is all very well for Members of Parliament to hold the strong view that abortion should not be allowed when a foetal abnormality is detected. They have the right to propose legislation that would prohibit such abortions. However, when we discuss such measures we should remember that we, personally, would not have to live with the consequences if the law were so amended.

It is the women denied abortion and their families who would suffer the consequences of such a restriction. Their lives—not ours—would be profoundly changed by the need to care for a child with a serious disability. In many cases, the other children in the family would suffer most. Organisations such as Support Around Termination for Foetal Abnormality, which provides counselling and assistance for those whose pregnancies are affected, know how important the option of abortion is. They know that the choice of abortion is valued even by those who choose not to take it.

Most abortions in this country are performed because the pregnancy is unwanted in circumstances where two doctors agree that it would be damaging to the mental wellbeing of the woman if she were forced to continue it. They are the abortions that some hon. Members are particularly keen to prohibit. But have they thought about what it would mean in practice? Have they thought about what it would really mean for a woman to bear a child that she desperately does not want?

Contraception is not fail-safe. Organisations such as the Birth Control Trust remind us frequently that about a third of pregnancies are conceived by women who say that they were using contraception when they became pregnant. About 50 per cent. of pregnancies are unplanned. Not all unplanned pregnancies will be unwanted, but many will be and we must think carefully about the consequences for individual women and for the whole of society if such women are forced to have those children against their will.

Motherhood is a great responsibility—it is difficult even for those who embrace it willingly. It is worth stating that no woman ever wants to have an abortion. However, many believe that it is the best solution to a dire problem. We have only to look to Northern Ireland to see what happens when legal abortion is severely restricted. Every year, more than 2,000 desperate women travel to England for the procedure. More than 4,000 women travel to England from Eire, where abortion is illegal in all circumstances. Those who 779 cannot afford to travel here sometimes try to abort themselves—that is what happened in Britain before the Abortion Act 1967 allowed safe, legal abortion.

Women have consciences and so do their doctors. Abortion is not a casual choice by women who cannot be bothered to use contraception: it is the last resort of those who are pregnant and who are convinced that it would be better if the potential child were not born. It would be a tragedy for the women if the abortion law were restricted.

The Abortion Act 1967 has served women and their doctors well. Those who oppose abortion in principle like to remind us that there have been almost 4 million legal abortions since the Act became law. They sometimes claim that that is an abhorrence. It is possible to interpret that figure differently and see it as a measure of the benefit that the Act has conferred on women and their existing families: that number of abortions took place because that number was necessary for the well-being of women and their families.

The debate on the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990 allowed the opportunity for considerable debate about amendments to the abortion law. The issues were discussed in great detail and some changes were made to the law. The Bill that the hon. Member for Basildon (Mr. Amess) seeks to put before the House is not motivated by new developments or discoveries that require the Act to be amended. Public opinion is not pressing for a change in the law. The need for abortion on the grounds that it is currently provided in this country remains as pressing today as in 1967.

It is the responsibility of those who sit in the House to draft and pass legislation that affects the everyday lives of the millions of people who live in this country. It is right that we take into account issues that are perceived to be morally difficult or troublesome, but we would be doing the women of this country a great disservice if we allowed access to safe, clinical procedure to be more restricted than it is at present. I ask the House to oppose the Bill.

Question put, pursuant to Standing Order No. 19 (Motions for leave to bring in Bills and nomination of Select Committees at commencement of public business), and agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. David Amess, Mr. David Alton, Mr. Joe Benton, Sir Graham Bright, Mr. Edward Leigh, Mr. Thomas McAvoy, Mr. John 780 McFall, Mr. Robert Parry, Mrs. Elizabeth Peacock, Rev. Martin Smyth, Dr. Robert Spink and Mrs. Ann Winterton.