How the abortion ‘fact checkers’ got it wrong

Reuters was quick off the mark. Within hours of last week’s vote, its fact-checkers had a piece up headlined “Britain’s House of Lords has not legalised abortion up to birth.”

Clause 208, they explain, only removes criminal liability for the woman. The Abortion Act 1967 still governs doctors. The 24-week limit remains. So, Reuters argues, the claim that abortion for full-term babies will now be legal is false.

Even as a matter of narrow statutory interpretation, this is misleading. And as a full description of what has actually changed, it totally misses the point.

Once the bill gets Royal Assent, and that is where it is heading, a woman who procures her own abortion at any gestational age, for any reason, faces no legal consequence at all. The only accurate reading of the Lords’ vote is thus that abortion up to birth – previously unlawful – will now be lawful. Contrast that with what Reuters proclaim.

Abortion is a criminal offence under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861. The 1967 Abortion Act carves out an exception to that, subject to conditions, generally up to 24 weeks. That criminal framework applies to doctors, to third parties, and to the woman herself. What Clause 208 does is abolish this last element.

What now protects the life of a baby at 30 weeks gestation? At 34? Before last Wednesday, the answer was the criminal law. After Royal Assent, the answer will be nothing.

The pills-by-post scheme gives this reality teeth. Since 2020, women have been able to have mifepristone and misoprostol posted to them after a phone call in which they state how far along they are. No scan. No examination. Nobody checks. The pills are approved for home use up to 10 weeks. When a woman takes them further along in her pregnancy, she faces delivering her baby, either stillborn or alive, alone at home with heightened risk of serious complication.

None of this is speculative. Carla Foster got pills by post by saying she was 7 weeks pregnant. She was over 32 weeks. She delivered a dead baby at home. This isn’t just bad for babies, it’s bad for women. FOI data from six ambulance services showed a 64% rise in emergency call-outs linked to abortion pills. Separate research projected over 10,000 women needed hospital treatment after taking pills at home in a single year. And yet Baroness Stroud’s amendment to bring back in-person consultations for abortion pills was voted down 191 to 119.

What comes next is not hard to predict. Pills by post was supposed to be a temporary Covid measure. But it lives on. The proponents of this change say this is just about the woman. But if a woman can abort a child at any stage, it will not be long before someone will ask why a doctor who helps her should face prosecution. “Why criminalise a doctor for assisting what the law permits?”, they will say. The 24-week limit, unenforceable against the woman, quickly starts to look arbitrary against the doctor.

The most significant change to the law on unborn life in England and Wales since 1967 was the result of 46 minutes of Commons debate. There was a late-night Lords division at the far end of a marathon sitting, and no public consultation or evidence sessions. The women and children who will bear its consequences deserve a more honest account of what has been done than the fact-checkers are offering.