Crime and Policing Bill

Debate between Rebecca Smith and Catherine Fookes

Report stage
Tuesday 17th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Smith]

No, I will make some progress.

Those who champion new clause 1 claim that it is needed to stop arrests, long investigations and the prosecution of women, but it is important to highlight that prosecutions under sections 58 and 59 of the Offences Against the Person Act almost always relate to males inducing or coercing women into abortions. By decriminalising women, we would, by implication, also stop the opportunity to prosecute abusive or coercive males. To be prosecuted for aiding and abetting abortion, there needs to have been a case to answer in the first place.

Instead, I stand here to suggest a better route forward: new clause 106, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson). She has rehearsed the arguments for that new clause excellently, but I will add that freedom of information requests have revealed that one in 17 women who took pills by post required hospital treatment—equivalent to more than 10,000 women between April 2020 and September 2021. Further investigation found that the number of ambulance service call-outs relating to abortion increased in London. They also increased in the south-west, where my constituency is, from 33 in 2019 to 74 in 2020—a 124% increase. That correlates directly with the removal of the need for a doctor’s appointment. At-home abortions were made permanent by just 27 votes in March 2022. Polling in June 2025 found that two thirds of women support a return to in-person appointments. I call on the House to support new clause 106.

[Catherine Fookes]

I rise to speak in support of new clause 1, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi), which would remove women from the criminal law on abortion. Before my election last year, I served as the director of the Women’s Equality Network Wales, and this issue has long been close to my heart.

Until very recently, violent men ending their partners’ pregnancies made up the bulk of prosecutions under this 1861 law, but recently we have seen a big rise in women being targeted, many erroneously. This is not a law that exists in Northern Ireland, Scotland, France, Canada, Australia, New Zealand or even, Members may be surprised to know, the most anti-abortion states of America, but it is increasingly used against women in this country.

I want to take some time today to speak about one of these women. I will call her Becca, which I stress is not her real name. I know about what happened to Becca because her mum and dad were horrified at what happened, and they want us to hear about the injustice this law causes and to think of Becca when we cast our votes later.