Abortion (Disability Equality) Bill [HL]

Lord O'Shaughnessy Excerpts

Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 24th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Gale (Lab)]

My Lords, we have had a thorough debate on this amendment and I thank my noble friend Lord Winston, who has such great expertise in this field, for his clarity in explaining why he wishes to move this amendment.

This is a sensitive matter with strongly held views on both sides. The noble Baroness, Lady Tonge, mentioned a woman’s right to choose: many people hold that view. My noble friend Lady Massey said that this was not a political issue. I agree that it is not a political issue. Whenever these matters are debated, in both Houses, Members have to make up their own mind; I think that that is the right thing to do. The term “back-street abortionist” has been used several times this afternoon. Many of us remember those days and absolutely no one wants to go back to a time when women were put at such great risk.

The noble Baroness, Lady O’Loan, mentioned Northern Ireland. We may be debating that later, on other amendments, but I take her point. The arguments have been well rehearsed on both sides of the debate today and from the Front Bench I can say only that the Opposition still fully support the Abortion Act 1967.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord O'Shaughnessy) (Con)]

My Lords, I start by joining other noble Lords in congratulating my noble friend Lord Shinkwin on steering the Bill through its Lords stages so far and on his engagement with noble Lords on the Bill. It raises important and sensitive issues about disability rights and abortion and it is quite right and proper that these are discussed and scrutinised at length by your Lordships. I am also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Winston, for his amendment and for the scientific authority which he brings to the issues. I commend all noble Lords for the quality of the debate we have had on this amendment.

As I set out in Committee, the issue of abortion is a matter of conscience for noble Lords, as the noble Lord, Lord Alton, and the noble Baroness, Lady Massey, reminded us. The decisions that we take on this transcend the normal political or partisan divides and it is for that reason that the Government have taken and continue to take a neutral position on this issue and on the Bill. The Government do not, therefore, have a position on the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Winston, or on those that will follow in the House today. I do not intend to comment on subsequent amendments unless there are specific points that noble Lords wish to put directly to me and to which I can respond.

I do, however, wish to make one point that I believe is germane to the issues under discussion in this amendment and, indeed, in the Bill in general, and that is that it is vital that we have accurate statistics on and evidence for the reasons for termination of pregnancy. Officials are working directly with hospital staff to improve reporting on abortions. We have also reminded all doctors involved in abortion care of their legal responsibility under the Abortion Act 1967 and the Abortion Regulations 1991 to submit form HSA4, the abortion notification form, within 14 days of a termination.

Overall, between 2013 and 2015, there was an 18% increase in the number of reported ground E abortions. While we obviously cannot claim that this increase is solely the result of increased reporting of these abortions, as opposed to increased instances, we do know that this is the case in some of the units that officials have been working directly with. The department will continue to monitor carefully levels of underreporting of abortions for foetal abnormality.

The noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, asked about palliative care for babies. I fear that I do not have that information to hand but I will be happy to write to her on the issue.

[Lord Shinkwin]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have expressed support for my Bill and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Winston, for his medical lecture on so-called serious foetal anomalies. I address the noble Lord, Lord Winston, with respect but I also address him and all other noble Lords as an equal. I should say at the outset that I totally reject the very premise of this amendment. Other noble Lords have already explained why the amendment is totally inappropriate and, indeed, crassly insensitive, from a Northern Ireland perspective in particular, when it is linked to Amendment 8. I offer a disabled person’s perspective on why it is unacceptable. I have been consistently clear that the purpose of my Bill—a disability rights Bill—is to bring the law as it applies to disability discrimination before birth into line with the laws that your Lordships’ House has already passed to counter disability discrimination after birth.

Noble Lords will know that I accepted an amendment in Committee for an impact review as a logical amendment to a logical Bill. However, in the context of a Bill which promotes disability equality where discrimination begins before birth, this cynical amendment is not remotely logical. Indeed, it runs counter to the very essence of my Bill. The amendment reinforces discrimination because it singles out even more acutely a particular group for destruction on grounds of disability. It seeks to legitimise their destruction after 24 weeks with terminology that commands no clinical consensus and despite the fact that cell-free foetal DNA can first be detected in maternal blood as early as seven weeks’ gestation, which means that genetic or chromosomal abnormalities are being detected well in advance of 24 weeks. So what justification is there for abortion after 24 weeks on the grounds of so-called serious foetal anomaly?

Some noble Lords have seen that I recently asked the Department of Health about the number of fatal foetal abnormalities diagnosed in each of the past five years. The answer was that the information is not collected centrally. I followed up and asked about the number of fatal foetal abnormalities diagnosed after 24 weeks in each of the past five years. The answer was the same: the information is not collected centrally. I find that revealing, not because information is being concealed but because it reflects the reality—the truth of the situation.

Those noble Lords who were invited to attend a meeting on this issue, which I understand was held somewhere in the House on Wednesday, could be forgiven for thinking that there is some medical authority—some clear medical consensus—behind the definition of “fatal foetal abnormality”. There is not because there is not an agreed definition. Indeed, the consensus is that what is considered fatal or life-limiting involves a degree of subjective judgment which is influenced by understandings and by the availability of technology, both of which can change with time. The noble Lords who received the invitation to that meeting might also have got the impression, as was intended by the wording of the invitation, that those 230 disabled babies aborted after 24 weeks in 2015 had all been diagnosed with severe or fatal foetal abnormalities. They were not. Of the 659 babies aborted for the crime of having Down’s syndrome, for example, two were aborted at 25 weeks, one at 26 weeks, one at 28, one at 30, another at 31, three at 32 weeks, two at 33, two at 34—and one at 39 weeks.