Conscientious Objection (Medical Activities) Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord McColl of Dulwich and Lord Winston

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

[Lord McColl of Dulwich (Con)]

My Lords, the thing that all the amendments in this group hold in common is the belief that conscientious objection should be provided only in relation to hands-on activity; that is, of actually performing the abortion. They suggest that other facilitating activities on which the performance of an abortion depend should not be included within the scope of the conscientious objection.

If we are serious about conscientious objection, this simply does not make sense. If we recognise that different people have different views about the morality of abortion and that while some of us regard abortion as perfectly moral and acceptable, others find it difficult to distinguish it morally from the taking of life of someone who has been born, we have to accept that the moral difficulty lies not just in the act of the abortion but also in the act of facilitating it, as has been mentioned. It seems to me that when we are clear that something is wrong, we are also clear that facilitating that thing, whatever it may be, is also wrong. We understand that if anyone who facilitates becomes complicit in the act in question, a moral responsibility is thus engaged. In this context, these amendments simply do not make sense.

If we were to accept the logic on which they rest, we would have to expunge from our law any recognition that someone who helps to facilitate an illegal act has any kind of culpability. Culpability should rest only with the person who does the act. Mindful of these considerations, it is difficult to see these amendments as anything other than an attempt to undermine and weaken conscientious objection. If someone genuinely believes that an act is wrong, the provision of a legal assurance that they do not have to do the act but only facilitate it makes the profession in question no longer open to them. It is as if they have been required to actually carry out the act itself. Anyone in this situation with a sense of integrity and wholeness that requires consistency across their moral life would have to leave the profession in that context.

I have friends who, when they went up for a consultant post in obstetrics, were asked the question, “Are you prepared to take your share of abortions?” If they said yes they were considered for the appointment. If, on the other hand, they said, “Yes, I am quite prepared to take my share of the abortions within the Act of 1967”, they were not considered for the appointment and they had to emigrate. I have many friends who had to do that.

[Lord Winston]

The Committee deserves clarity on that statement, if the noble Lord, Lord McColl, does not mind. I have huge respect for the amazing work that the noble Lord has done in surgery over very many years, but I have been in obstetric and gynaecological practice as a consultant for quite a long time and I have been on many interview bodies looking at staff who will be working in obstetrics and gynaecology. Sadly, I was not here for Second Reading, but I read the noble Lord’s Second Reading speech where he made that point very clearly. I do not recognise that happening in the services in which I have worked. In fact, that discrimination is exceptionally uncommon. I am very surprised that he said he found that a number of people have needed to go overseas. That seems rather an unusual situation. I would like some clarity on that. It is an important point because it affects the amendment I have tabled for later in the discussion.

[Lord McColl of Dulwich]

I thank the noble Lord for his intervention. I am not saying that it happens now; I am saying what I found in my experience. They were my friends, and I can give the noble Lord their names and addresses. They were extremely good obstetricians practising in Australasia.

It seems to me an important part of the British liberal constitutional tradition that we place a lot of emphasis on freedom. This freedom has many aspects, but central to it is the opportunity to work in one’s chosen profession without being required to act in a way that violates one’s own identity. Ours is not a constitutional tradition in which we use the law to compel people to decide between acting against their deepest moral convictions and losing their livelihood. The hounding of people out of their jobs on this basis is deeply illiberal. Although our constitutional tradition is closely associated with liberty, there are moments in our history when we have failed in this regard. I fear that historians looking back on this set of amendments in a hundred years’ time might recoil from them and wonder how on earth we came so close to stepping away from our historic British commitment to liberty.

I am of course aware that beneath these amendments rests what some would purport to be a respectable argument. It goes something like this: women have a right to have an abortion. People who conscientiously object effectively have the temerity to suggest that their rights as a service provider are more important than the rights of the service user. In this context, we need to rein in our conscientious objection so that it applies only to the doing of the act, not to facilitating it. This logic is deeply flawed for two reasons. First, workers have rights and consumers have rights too.