Conscientious Objection (Medical Activities) Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord McColl of Dulwich and Lord Alton of Liverpool

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 23rd March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

Or not.

[Lord McColl of Dulwich]

Thank you—that is very helpful.

Somebody did suggest that there was not a great number of people with a conscientious objection. The NHS employs 1,200,000 people. Surely they can find enough people who would not be offended to be asked to do abortions. Has anyone thought about that? No. Surely it is possible for the NHS, with such a large workforce.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord McColl of Dulwich]

That is exactly right but, as I keep saying, there are hordes of people around—1,200,000 people—so you can surely find somebody who can delegate it. The noble Lord keeps pointing to the Bill, but surely there are so many people around in the clinic that somebody can do the delegation and make the arrangement.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, I am sure that the noble Lord is right in his interpretation of the Bill. It lays no duty on any other person to carry out that delegation and he is correct that there would be other people working in the service who would doubtless carry on as they do now. One abortion takes place every three minutes in this country, which is 20 every hour, 600 every working day and more than 200,000 every year. There have been more than 8 million abortions since 1967. Clearly, there is no shortage of people willing to participate in such procedures, but this Bill is about those who are unwilling to participate in them.