Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Anna Soubry)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Crausby. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Nadine Dorries) on securing this debate on a subject in which she has a long-standing interest. I have listened to the views expressed by Members, and I acknowledge that many of them are deeply and strongly held. The nub of both sides of the debate is best encapsulated by the speeches of the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston (Seema Malhotra) and my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce). They gave speeches based on their beliefs, knowledge and sound arguments.
Anna Soubry
Forgive me, but I want to make progress, because the clock is against me. I will give way when I have made some points. In the short time available, it is important that I make some of the main points in my speech.
It is right that abortion is a matter of conscience. It is important to respect the views of all individuals and accept that we have different views, whichever side of the political fence we sit on. My hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Mr Amess) reminded us that certain Cabinet members have expressed their own views on the upper limit for legal abortions. They all made it clear that those are their own personally expressed views. I want to make it quite clear that, notwithstanding the fact that some Cabinet members may want a reduction in the upper limit, the Government have no plans to bring about a change to the time at which an abortion can be carried out. I want to stress that point again, so I repeat: we have no plans to review the Abortion Act 1967.
We are by no means complacent. When I was fortunate enough to be made a Minister, I made it clear that in the time I am in office I want a reduction in the number of abortions. We all want that, but there is a debate about how we best achieve it. I take the view that we best achieve it through better contraception and by empowering our young men and women to make the choices that they want to make, if they have a sexual relationship.
Anna Soubry
I will, but I want to make these points because they are important. I want better counselling services—
Anna Soubry
I will. I also want more work done on why so many women have more than one abortion, which is of great concern to people on both sides of the argument. There is a lot of work to be done.
I want to say something on counselling that may interest my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire in particular. As the new Minister with responsibility for this matter, I have carefully considered how we move forward on abortion counselling. I believe that the best way forward is about contraception, how we reduce the repeat abortion rate, how we empower young men and women and how we improve abortion counselling services for women generally. A committee was formed as a result of the measures that my hon. Friend tried to introduce. There is also a cross-party inquiry into unwanted pregnancy, led by my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings and Rye (Amber Rudd). I commend that. They will do important work and hear important evidence, but the simple reality is that we therefore no longer plan to undertake a separate consultation on abortion counselling. I am sorry if that disappoints members of the committee.
For the purposes of transparency, I will today place in the Library a short document on abortion counselling, representing the great work done by my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Anne Milton). I pay tribute to the work she did when she was Minister for Public Health, and to the cross-party committee, which looked at counselling arrangements for women requesting an abortion. I am extremely grateful for the work it did, and I thank its members for their efforts. I am sorry if there is disappointment, but we do not intend to change the law, so a separate consultation would be an otiose exercise.
Nadine Dorries
It is not a case of changing the law, but changing the Government’s commitment. The Government made an absolute commitment to consult. In fact, the British Medical Association moved a motion in agreement. Why have the Government changed their mind about the consultation on non-compulsory independent counselling?
Anna Soubry
The committee has done some good work. I do not think that it would be right to take the matter any further. I am sorry if that disappoints people, but that is my view. I can see no purpose in a consultation, because we do not intend to change either the law or the guidelines.
As the committee identified, counselling services throughout the NHS are patchy. That is not acceptable. It also decided that it is of primary importance that there are no delays when a woman seeks a termination of her pregnancy. That is why it is important that if a woman is going to have a termination, she does it as quickly as possible. The group was in unanimous agreement on that, which I welcome. There is other work to be done on counselling, but I take the view that that is not the primary issue that we should address, which is why I made the decision I did.
Naomi Long
Everyone, whether pro-life, like me, or pro-choice, agrees that we would like a reduction in the number of abortions. Does the Minister have any concerns that the policy of limiting child-related benefits to two children could increase the financial pressure and stress on people who find themselves pregnant, thus driving up the number of abortions, rather than reducing it?
Anna Soubry
No is the simple answer, but I am happy to discuss it further with the hon. Lady.
In the short time I am allowed, I want to talk about viability, bearing in mind the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Bedfordshire and the helpful interventions of the hon. Member for Feltham and Heston. The current clinical evidence shows that although there have been medical advances in caring for premature babies, only a small number of babies born at under 24 weeks’ gestation can survive, and there may well be questions about their quality of life. Most have severe problems. The situation markedly improves at 24 to 25 weeks, which reaffirms why the limit of 24 weeks was chosen.
Results from the EPICure study, which looked at the chances of survival and later health status of children born at less than 26 weeks, show that survival to discharge was 0% at 21 weeks, 1% at 22 weeks, and 11% at 23 weeks. Of the two children in the study born at 22 weeks’ gestation who survived to discharge, one had severe disability and one had mild disability at 6 years of age.
The British Association of Perinatal Medicine stated, in evidence to the 2007 Select Committee on Science and Technology inquiry on abortion, that it was concerned that lowering the legal definition of viability would imply that quality of survival has improved for infants below the present limit of 24 weeks. The evidence for the UK population to date does not support that.
Even though some babies have survived at a very early stage, the threshold of viability cannot be continually pushed back, because there is a limit beyond which the lungs will simply be insufficiently developed to sustain life. Although embryonic lungs start to form as early as four weeks into a pregnancy, their maturation continues until the end of a normal pregnancy. Recent data published by the Office for National Statistics show that 0.1% of live births occurred at less than 24 weeks, and the mortality rate for those babies was 877.3 deaths per 1,000 live births.
We are right to ask why women have late abortions. Women who have such abortions do so in the most extreme situations. They work with their doctors, nurses and loved ones to make what must be the most difficult choice that any woman, or her partner, will ever face. We have heard why so many hon. Members feel that the current 24-week limit should be retained, and why others feel strongly that the limit should be reduced. I personally support the retention of the 24-week limit, but my priority is to reduce the number of women who turn up at a clinic or doctor’s surgery seeking a termination.
My hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Mr Leigh) spoke about the pain and suffering of women who undergo termination of a pregnancy, but perhaps he forgets the pain, suffering and mental distress of women who found that the law did not allow them that choice. My priority is ensuring that women have informed choice, and that we have fewer abortions.