In England, Scotland and Wales, abortion was legalized in 1967 through the Abortion Act. At that time, the British legislation was one of the most liberal in Europe. Today, it is under threat. A real ideological war travels across the island, implemented through the in no way ideological measures of the government whose aim is to cut spending in the public hospitals.
In Britain, abortion may be carried out during the first 24 weeks of pregnancy so long as certain criteria are met or later in cases where it is necessary to save the woman’s life, to prevent grave permanent injury to the pregnant woman or in cases of the risk of fetus malformation. The rate of legal abortions if compared with the rate of births has remained stable between 23% and 26% from 1985 to 1997, increasing up to 30% in 2001. Regarded as one of the most important democratic rights of women, since all of them, regardless of social class, may use a public hospital when they wish to terminate an unintended pregnancy, the legalization of abortion has led to the almost total disappearance, in the statistics, of deaths from abortion complications in England. Now, under pressure of religious groups and also because the Conservative government’s plan to make budget cuts in public hospitals, the right to legal abortion is running the risk of returning to be a true human tragedy as it is in Latin America and in all semi-colonial countries.
A Via Crucis to get there
A pathetic situation – that is what is happening in England currently. Any woman who chooses to end a pregnancy by abortion, i.e. a woman who requires to put in force her legal rights, is immensely pushed by many entities of all kinds – religious, pseudo-medical, NGOs, legislators, lobbyists, etc., – in order to give up abortion. As if she was an ignorant, a naïve person or a woman adrift, completely lost, who needed pieces of advice to adopt the correct path. The bourgeois state granted the legalization of abortion but continues to treat women as inferior human beings, as a fragile person unable to take serious decisions, and being so, in need of the helping hand of the patriarchal state.
In this real intense struggle through which women have to travel to reach the abortion, she is constantly subject to “explanations” about the gravity of her decision. Those in charge of offering these “explanations” are priests, nuns and cures of different sects and religions, also the bourgeois parties members, the Catholic doctors who believe in life after death, anyway, a true illegal lobbying behind the scenes in order to prevent the law from being enforced.
To make things even worse the government litany saying they need to cut the public service’s expenses in order to pay the state’s debts turned this lobby even stronger and it can even become a requirement that women go through this “counseling” before abortion.
Campaign for the amendment approval
They are all sinister figures, mainly the Conservative MP Nadine Dorries, who led the campaign to pressure Parliament to restrict abortion rights. She proposed an amendment to the law that, if approved, will oblige every women looking for an abortion to go through a CPCs (Crisis Pregnancy Centers) for a preliminary opinion. Her purpose is to reduce abortions, trying in every way to persuade women to give up of terminating a pregnancy. There are hundreds of CPCs around the English cities; they are organizations independent of the NHS (National Health System) that offer “advice” about pregnancy and abortion. Sometimes they also offer pregnancy tests and other free services to attract the poorest women. Some of these entities are run by religious groups or charities institutions and others are maintained by better structured networks, such as Life, which opposes abortion in all circumstances.
The largest network, with more than 100 CPCs, is maintained by Care Confidential, which became an independent entity in July after joining the Christian Action Research and Education (Care) that supports lobbies of MPs in Parliament in order to present amendments against several themes, including gay rights, abortion rights and embryo research. In order to give a more scientific image to her proposal, Dorries says her campaign has the supervision of a physician, Dr Peter Saunders of the Christian Medical Center, a lobby group which states that its members include more than 4,000 physicians. Dorries also has the support of the group Right to Know, which was formed just to lobby in Parliament in favor of Dorries’ amendment. However, neither Dorries nor Frank Field, a Labour Party member (out of office), who is co-representative of the amendment, nor the Right to Know campaign reveal details about who is involved in this campaign and who is funding it. (The Guardian, 9/2011)
The Right to Know campaign is directed by Adrian Yalland, a lobbyist who is also a member of the Conservative Party. He describes the group as consisting of individuals who voluntarily contribute with their own resources. According to him, “This is a campaign that has attracted the support of people of diverse beliefs and financial conditions (including atheists and humanists, like me) who simply share the same view, namely that the woman who wants an abortion should get counseling” (The Guardian, 9/2011).
One of the major spokespersons of the campaign is the group Christian Concern, affiliated to an American evangelical organization, that has ties with the Christian Legal Centre (CLC) and the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF). They have joined forces to create the Wilberforce Academy in England, which trains people “to serve in the Christ-centers,” equipping them “with a robust biblical network that teaches to think, pray and act on the problems of our society”. The ADF, which grossed nearly $ 40 million last year, was founded by religious leaders, including prominent members of the American rightwing (The Guardian, 9/2011).
Feminists in a defensive position
In face of such a huge lobbying, the few women groups that still exist in England are doing their best. They have organized a demonstration with no more than 300 people to try to avoid the changes in the law. Darinka Aleksic, president of the Abortion Rights Group, said: “There is no guarantee that the purposes of these proposals are not to prevent women from having access to abortion.” Dr. Evan Harris, member of the Democratic Party and of the British Medical Association’s Ethics Committee, said he does not believe that doctors are supporting this campaign: “There is no evidence of a real problem and there is clear evidence of a risk to women in disrupting the current arrangements”. The British Medical Association has voted in 2008 against the reduction in the current 24-week limit for legal abortion.
In a clear demonstration that the Conservative government of Cameron works quietly in order to impose difficulties to abortion, a spokesman for the Health Department said the government is considering proposals to make it viable that all women can get through counseling with qualified professionals. “It is vital that every woman who wants an abortion have complete and sound information so that she can decide” (The Guardian, 9/2011). In other words, the government is planning to put obstacles in enforcing the law.
So much so that the government made a move to defeat Nadine Dorries’ amendment, because it was very unpopular and would surely lose. In a last minute action, Frank Field, from the Labour Party withdrew his support to the amendment which was rejected by 368 votes against 118. Field withdrew his support to Dorries after Anne Milton, the Health Minister had said the government would work towards implementing the spirit of Dorries’ proposal. Milton said: “The government supports the spirit of this amendment and we will try to submit proposals to regulate abortion in that sense.” Dorries obviously celebrated the discourse of Anne Milton as a victory, and said: “We lost the battle but will win the war”. (The Guardian, 10/2011)
These proposals are highly likely to win if there is not an immediate response, a great mobilization of women in the opposite trenches. But while the rightists go on to fighting with all its mighty powers to try to destroy abortion rights, women’s entities remain in the background, with a mild and conciliatory speech. Ann Furedi, director of the BPAs, merely said that she was happy because Nadine Dorries’ amendment had been rejected. “We hope to be able to concentrate our efforts in the discussion of this issue because it is a genuine problem for pregnant women.” Dorries insisted that her objective is not restricting access to abortion. “I do not want to go back to the days when abortionists were on the streets; I defend the right to decide” (The Guardian, 10/2011).
To defend the conquered rights
It is not what it looks like. This is a perverse situation, because just the most vulnerable women who need some guidance fall into the trap when facing the critical situation of getting pregnant without means to carry out with it or when they do not want to have the child. So they massively seek for the counseling centers, which are free just to attract the most vulnerable. But what kind of guidance do they find there? To say the least, priests, nuns, dishonest doctors advise them to give up abortion. The advice is often indirect, through a fraternal speech, but with a non fraternal content: that she carries a live human being in her belly; it is a sin to prevent this life from coming to existence; if she does it she will be committing a crime.
This type of “advice” takes out the woman’s right to freely decide what to do with her life. It leaves her in a hopeless situation, and in general she tends to be resigned. The right-wing sectors’ campaign rests precisely in this strategy: put women, especially the poorest and most in need of help, in a hopeless position, making them feel guilty by the decision.
The struggle to defend the right to free and legal abortion, in England, therefore, must address these two obstacles: the powerful ideological campaign of the right, on one hand and, on the other, the government’s campaign against free public services. Many women have been organizing outside the “trade unions” in the so-called movements against cuts in public services. We must popularize these movements, to make it possible that all working and poor women find room in there to fight for the right to abortion maintenance.
But above all, it is essential that women organize themselves within their unions. Currently, British unions have large female membership and they must organize counseling services for women, with skilled and experienced people under direct control of workers, a democratic service which respects the views of all women, a counseling center where they can find a real help in accordance with their interests, that really solve their problem and set them free of the indecision about what to do. Thus, the working class will be emptying those religious centers organized by rightist groups, with the complicity of the government and the MPs, which exist only to hinder law enforcement and prevent abortions. It is also critical that women urge their unions to incorporate this fundamental fight as a demand of the working class – not just the women – because it reaches the whole working class interests and now is running the risk of being lost.
