§ Mrs. Wiseasked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will ensure that the National Health Service in each region provides (a) medical termination of pregnancy on social grounds to women legally entitled to this and (b) sterilisation on social grounds to women whose circumstances warrant this.
§ Mr. MoyleI have emphasised the need to improve NHS abortion facilities on a number of occasions and, in planning guidelines issued in March this year —circular HC(78)12—my Department asked health authorities to review the provision for women seeking termination of pregnancy and in particular to develop day-care abortion facilities. The decision on whether the criteria set out in the Abortion Act 1967 are met in any particular case rests of course, with the registered medical practitioners involved.
It is the policy of my Department that sterilisation for women should be available for both medical and family planning reasons and the guidelines to which I have referred asked health authorities to expand sterilisation services within the gynaecological service and in family planning clinics.