\n<\/p>\n
MPs voted last year to end the criminalisation of women who terminate pregnancies outside the legal framework. It was hailed as the biggest step forward for reproductive rights in England and Wales in six decades.<\/p>\n
On Wednesday evening, abortion law will again come under the parliamentary spotlight when members of the House of Lords put forward their proposed amendments to the legislation.<\/p>\n
Last summer, MPs voted to decriminalise abortion, with an amendment to the crime and policing bill \u2013 now adopted as a clause \u2013 put forward by Tonia Antoniazzi, a Labour backbencher. Support was overwhelming, with 379 in favour and 137 against.<\/p>\n
Under the legislation, which is yet to be enacted, women who end their pregnancies outside the legal framework will not be prosecuted. That framework \u2013 which includes the need for two doctors\u2019 signatures and has time limits at which terminations can be carried out \u2013 remains the same, and doctors who act outside the law still face prosecution.<\/p>\n
Harriet Wistrich, a solicitor and chief executive of the Centre for Women\u2019s Justice, said police did have discretion over whether to make an arrest. Even if they believed a case may require investigation, they could instead invite a suspect to the police station for a voluntary interview.<\/p>\n
Amendments can be laid in the House of Lords until Tuesday, the day before they will be considered. The member who lays the amendment can choose to call a division \u2013 or put it to a vote. It is anticipated that there will be multiple votes on abortion proposals on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Nine amendments have been laid on abortion so far, including proposals to have a police investigation of every girl under 16 who accesses a legal abortion and a proposal for the first new abortion offence in nearly 100 years.\u00a0The key amendments are two broadly pro-choice and two broadly anti-abortion proposals.<\/p>\n
One amendment, proposed by Rosa Monckton, a prominent \u201cpro-life\u201d Conservative peer, is known as a \u201cstrikethrough\u201d amendment, which seeks to delete the decriminalisation clause from the bill.<\/p>\n
In an emergency measure passed during the pandemic, and later made permanent in legislation in 2022, women can access remote consultations for pregnancies up to nine weeks and six days. An amendment put forward by the Conservative peer Philippa Stroud seeks to end telemedicine and return to in-person consultations in all cases. A similar amendment put before the Commons in June was unsuccessful.<\/p>\n
Abortion offences are classed as violent crimes, meaning they will permanently be disclosed as part of a DBS check. Put forward by Glenys Thornton, a Labour peer and former health minister, this amendment would legislate to pardon women who have convictions or cautions for abortion offences and remove affected women\u2019s details from police systems.<\/p>\n
Women who are under investigation now by police still face prosecution, even though the law may have changed by the time their cases come to court. An amendment put forward by Liz <\/strong>Barker, a Liberal Democrat peer, would expand the legislation to include women whose alleged offences were committed before the change in law, ensuring that any current investigations and prosecutions against women under abortion law are discontinued.<\/p>\n The bill is expected to finish its passage through parliament in the coming weeks. If parliament votes to retain decriminalisation of abortion, it will become law on the day it receives royal assent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" MPs voted last year to end the criminalisation of women who terminate pregnancies outside the legal framework. It was hailed as the biggest step forward for reproductive rights in England and Wales in six decades. On Wednesday evening, abortion law will again come under the parliamentary spotlight when members of the House of Lords put<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46822,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[5457,23818,23817,671,2639,12835],"class_list":{"0":"post-46821","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-abortion","9":"tag-amend","10":"tag-decriminalising","11":"tag-house","12":"tag-legislation","13":"tag-lords"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46821"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46821\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/46822"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}When is the crime and policing bill expected to become law?<\/h2>\n