The Scottish architect of Britain’s abortion legislation has intervened on the 50th anniversary of his bill becoming law to call for terminations to be fast-tracked to prevent the UK falling behind other countries.
Lord Steel, the former Liberal leader and Scottish parliament presiding officer, believes that in future only one doctor rather than two should be required to give permission for a non-surgical abortion in the first trimester of pregnancy — a move that opponents fear could lead to more abortions at an earlier stage.
He weighed into the debate as the Scottish government considers whether to do more to support women who wish to have late-stage abortions from 18-20 weeks’ gestation, some of whom currently have to travel to England for treatment funded by the Scottish NHS.
Nicola Sturgeon is also considering giving women from Northern Ireland access to NHS abortions in Scotland, with abortions currently illegal in Northern Ireland except for cases where the woman’s health is at risk. The Scottish first minister has resisted calls for the time limit to be reduced from 24 weeks.
“I think it would be sensible to recognise that people taking a pill don’t need two doctors to certify that it is necessary,” Steel told The Sunday Times.
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“Most of our neighbours in Europe have adopted a policy based on early abortion, up to the first trimester and making it really quite simple, and I think that is an approach which is quite sensible.” A coalition of women’s rights groups, including Scottish Women’s Aid, recently argued that, with abortion law devolved to Holyrood as part of the Scotland Act 2016, the SNP government should “be bold in creating a distinctive approach” by removing it from criminal statute and regulating it like any other healthcare procedure.
Abortions in Scotland peaked in 2008 and fell steadily until 2014 before rising 2.6% in 2015 to 12,082. Scotland has an abortion rate of 11.6 per 1,000 women aged 15 to 44, compared with a rate of 17 per 1,000 in England and Wales; 72.5% of all abortions in Scotland are carried out at less than nine weeks’ gestation, with a fifth carried out after 10 weeks. The figure for terminations carried out in Scotland over 18 weeks in 2015 was 1.5%.
While Steel is sympathetic to women from Northern Ireland coming to Scotland, he believes this would be difficult to implement. “How can a devolved administration in one part of the UK interfere in the devolved administration in another part?” he said.
