Abortion (Northern Ireland) (No. 2) Regulations 2020

Baroness Hollins Excerpts

Monday 15th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hollins (CB) [V]]

My Lords, fear of difference and otherness extends to disability. Many of us still grow up with no personal experience of people with Down’s syndrome or cerebral palsy, and children might be cruel to someone with a cleft palate, but those are not reasons to propose the discriminatory practice of abortion for unborn babies with these conditions up to birth. This practice offends children and adults who live with so-called impairments, and it offends families who love their disabled family members unconditionally and are tired of seeing them discriminated against. Many people with Down’s syndrome say that it makes them feel like they should not have been born. A truly liberal society would welcome and celebrate difference. As my noble friend Lady O’Loan said, Regulation 7 is not CEDAW compliant: paragraph 85 stipulated that the law must be changed

“without perpetuating stereotypes towards disabled people.”

As a doctor and a mother, I support the amendments.