There are still battles to be fought

This year opened with the provision of the first legal abortion services in the Republic of Ireland on 1 January. This was achieved after a successful mass campaign to win a referendum to repeal of the eighth amendment, which had banned abortion. Nine months later, on October 22, over a century and half of criminalisation of abortion in Northern Ireland also ended, opening the door to legal services there.

It is difficult to overestimate the significance of these changes. For the first time women across the island of Ireland are finally able to legally access full reproductive health services without travelling across the Irish Sea or doctors risking prison. The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) reported in 2018 that:

“Since 2000, the NI Police Service (PSNI) has investigated over 30 cases of individuals suspected of procuring an abortion. Between 2006 and 2015, the PSNI made 11 arrests related to illegal abortion. Between 2011 and 2016, five people were questioned and arrested for possession of abortifacients; two were convicted.” 

Of course there are still battles to be fought, in practice abortion services in the Republic are not universal and are blocked where possible by anti abortion sections of the medical establishment. All women have to wait three days after first visiting a doctor to ask for an abortion before it can be carried out. Women in rural areas are particularly affected by limitations in provision. 

In the North, the archaic clauses of the 1861 Offences against the Persons Act were repealed in October after a decisive vote in Westminster in July 2019. This ruled that, in the absence of a devolved government in Stormont by the deadline of 21 October, the legislation that effectively barred abortion would be repealed. Immediately all criminal cases were dropped and no new ones will be prosecuted. However a ‘consultation’ period was imposed that’s means local services will not begin until March 2020.

Ireland is not the only place to see transformational change in abortion rights this year. In the Isle of Man dogged campaigning by the Campaign for Abortion Law Modernisation (Calm) led to the decriminalisation of abortion there. Australia’s New South Wales parliament passed a bill decriminalising abortion in September, overturning a 119-year-old law. In the same month the Mexican state of Oaxaca approved a bill to legalise abortion, making it the only region outside of Mexico city to allow abortion provision. In May the Icelandic parliament passed a bill that legalised abortions up to 22 weeks without women having to go in front of a committee to obtain permission to have an abortion after 16 weeks gestation.

In South Korea, after prochoice campaigning had forced the issue onto the agenda the Constitutional Court ruled that outlawing abortion – women who had abortions, and health care workers who helped them, faced prison – was unconstitutional. As a result South Korea’s 66-year ban on abortion will be lifted by the end of 2020. 

These are all real advances to celebrate, but elsewhere anti abortion campaigners are still on the offensive, not least in the US. Trump’s presidency has boosted the confidence of the anti-choice lobby and his nominations to the Supreme Court mean it now has an anti-abortion majority. Every month sees new legal tussles in cases aimed to limit abortion rights in certain states. Only last week the Supreme Court refused to hear a challenge to an act passed in Kentucky’s that forces women to submit to a “narrated ultrasound” before receiving an abortion. Prochoice campaigners have a real battle on their hands to stop the attacks on a woman’s right to choose. 

Back in Britain the campaign to liberalise abortion law in Ireland has helped shine a light on the restrictive law that underpins abortion rights in England and Wales. The clauses of the 19th century law that have just been repealed in Northern Ireland, which was never covered by the 1967 Abortion Act, still stand in Britain.  The 1967 law created exceptions that have enabled abortion provision in specific conditions since then, but abortion is still controlled by criminal law. 

It’s time for change and the call for abortion to be completely decriminalised has now won wide support. In a sign of just how much the political landscape has been transformed, the commitment to decriminalistion was included in the manifestos of the Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens.

However, the result of the general election has delivered a Tory government that has made no commitment to extending abortion rights. Boris Johnson has consistently abstained on votes on the issue and he argued this summer he did not support Westminster voting on liberalising the law in Northern Ireland. 

So if we are going to succeed in making this essential part of women’s reproductive health care taken out of criminal law we are going to have to fight for it. 

Abortion Rights is committed to this struggle. We ask you to support us, join us, contribute to our appeal fund and let’s make sure 2020 is the year we decriminalise abortion law across Britain. 

Judith Orr is on the Executive Committee of Abortion Rights and is the author of Abortion Wars, the fight for Reproductive Rights (Policy Press) https://policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/abortion-wars