The British parliament on Tuesday voted to decriminalize abortion in England and Wales to stop a growing number of women from being investigated by police for terminating pregnancies under legislation dating back to the mid-19th century.
Abortions have been legal in England and Wales for almost 60 years, but only up to 24 weeks and with the approval of two doctors. Women can face criminal charges if they end a pregnancy after 24 weeks under the Victorian-era law that carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
Although criminal convictions for breaking the law are rare, the number of prosecutions has increased following the COVID-19 pandemic, when a change in the law allowed abortion pills to be taken at home to end pregnancies within 10 weeks of conception.
Photo: Reuters
In a free vote in parliament, when politicians were not ordered to vote along party lines, lawmakers gave an initial approval by 379 votes to 137 for an amendment to stop prosecutions of women who end pregnancies in all circumstances.
Medical professionals who assist women in obtaining an abortion outside the 24-week limit could still face prosecution.
The proposal could still be altered or even voted down as it is a part of a greater bill that is making its way through the British House of Commons and the unelected upper chamber of parliament.
Labour Party lawmaker Tonia Antoniazzi, who proposed the amendment, said the law had been used to investigate 100 women in the past five years, including some who had given birth prematurely or had been forced into abortions by abusive partners.
“Each one of these cases is a travesty enabled by our outdated abortion law,” she told parliament. “This is not justice, it is cruelty and it has got to end.”
The vote was part of a broader government criminal justice bill that if passed in its entirety would bring the abortion laws in England and Wales in line with other Western countries including France, Canada and Australia.
The amendment would revoke parts of a law passed in 1861 by a then all-male parliament that made deliberately ending a pregnancy a crime and stipulated that those who carried it out could be “kept in penal servitude for life.”
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