What happened to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology (HFE) Bill abortion campaign in Parliament?

In the Summer and Autumn of 2008, the HFE Bill was passing through Parliament and FPA used this opportunity to try to change the 1967 Abortion Act. The 1967 Act gave women in England, Scotland and Wales the legal right to abortion, but was never extended to Northern Ireland. FPA launched a massive Parliamentary campaign to give women in Northern Ireland the same rights to abortion as women in the rest of the UK. The campaign included viral videos, a petition and a massive postcard campaign to MPs and the Prime Minister.

MPs in Westminster put down various amendments to the 1967 Abortion Act with the aim of extending it to Northern Ireland and modernising the current law. A cross-party group of MPs led by Diane Abbott tabled an amendment to extend the Abortion Act 1967 to women in Northern Ireland. The debate on these amendments was supposed to take place on Wednesday 22 October 2008, but it never happened.

A Programme Motion from the Government meant that the debate was scheduled so that the abortion amendments came last.Consequently, there was no time to debate or vote on abortion issues. Today, abortion services remain similar to how they were in the 1960s and women in Northern Ireland are still denied basic rights to abortion.

Despite this, FPA is not giving up. Thank you to all who sent postcards, signed the petition and wrote to your MP. The campaign will go on and we need your continued support. A new Motion has been tabled: find out if your MP has signed it. Please continue to sign the petition, send it to friends and family, and become a friend on the FPA Facebook page.

Parliamentary Motion to modernise abortion

As part of the campaign to improve the law on abortion, a Motion was tabled in Parliament calling for MPs to support amendments to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill to modernise the law, improve clinical practice and women's access to abortion.

These tabled amendments were:

• To reduce the need for two doctors' signatures to one doctor's certification that the pregnancy has not exceeded the legal time limit.
• To allow trained nurses and other trained healthcare practitioners to perform abortions.
• To allow abortions to be carried out in primary care settings (for example, general practice and contraception clinics).
• To allow women to take the second stage of an early medical abortion at home if they choose.
• To ensure that crisis pregnancy counselling organisations advertise whether or not they refer women for abortion.

FPA launched a campaign which supported the modernisation of abortion laws.

How does the HFE Bill relate to abortion?

The HFE Bill amended the 1990 HFE Act. It focused on assisted reproductive technology and regulates the creation of embryos and scientific research on embryos, genetic disease screening, and determining who should be treated as parents of a child in certain circumstances.

The HFE Bill provided the opportunity to change the law on abortion. The original law to make abortion legal in Britain was passed as the Abortion Act in 1967. But years later, when the abortion time limit was reduced from 28 weeks to 24 weeks, the 1990 HFE Act was used to amend the original abortion law.

As the 1990 HFE Act passed through Parliament to be updated, amended and reformed in Summer/Autumn 2008, it was seen as an opportunity to re-examine the Abortion Act which has become attached to it.