TM will allow a debate on restricting abortion to cling on to power.

[catgirl1976]

AIBU to be disgusted? I'm reading that she will allow a UK debate on abortion limits to secure the DUP's support.

She's a disgrace. I don't care if you voted Tory or Labour or for Lord Buckethead, but surely any woman must feel appalled that their rights are up for sale to secure her (untenable anyway) position.

Thank you Gentle, that's the one I was thinking of.

If we want to prevent late terminations we need to make the whole process easier and quicker, not further restrict women's access to late abortion.

This.

And anyone who would have a late abortion 'for fun' (really? ) probably has some sort of mental health issues and needs help rather than being forced to have a baby they would have otherwise been willing to terminate 'for fun' at 22/24 weeks.

If we want to prevent late terminations we need to make the whole process easier and quicker, not further restrict women's access to late abortion.

Absolutely in agreement here too. Current waits of 3+ weeks are standard, and I know of somebody who had to wait months - to her great distress, obviously.

If you are unfortunate and are at a trust that doesn't intervene pre 24 weeks then tough, your baby (it's born remember) has no rights as it doesn't acquire them until 24 weeks!

So what? I can't remember anyone asking my opinions on what they did to me after I was born.
What rights do you want for babies born before 24 weeks? And why can't you just be content with babies being given rights after they are fucking OUT of their mother's womb and the baby can't be used as excuse to TAKE AWAY HER BODILY AUTONOMY?

There is no excuse, no excuse at all, to force a woman to donate her whole body. No, not even for the survival of another person. No one would DREAM of forcing MEN to DONATE THEIR WHOLE DAMN BODIES to saven even a TODDLER's life!

If you want an abortion, at whatever term, you should be allowed to. It's no-one's business but yours. The state should provide the means to do so.
Theresa May should fuck back off to the 1700's.
Bring in AV, never ever have to suffer this sort of shit from the bastard Tories ever again after that.

I want the same rights for a baby born pre 24 weeks note I said born, so it's out of the womb as a baby born after 24 weeks.
I want it to be counted as a person, have a right to a birth certificate, and death certificate if needed. The right to be acknowledged as a person.

That has no effect on a woman's right to do whatever she wants to her body vestal the baby at this point is not even in the same room let alone her body. So you don't need to swear, the baby has no rights to these things at present even if it is OUT. That's my point. I think you must have misunderstood.

I would rather enable a few women like Star's SIL than deny women in genuine difficulty bodily autonomy.

The way I see it is that it's nothing to do with the foetus' right to life, and everything to do with the woman's body. If a person is dying and a kidney transplant can save them, you cannot force another person to give up their kidney in order to save the dying person, even though losing a kidney is a perfectly survivable thing. In fact, even if the person is dying from a rare blood disorder and there's only one person on earth who can save them and all they have to give up is one pint of blood, something that we can all easily spare, you still cannot force that person to give up their blood. Their right to their own body is considered first. The right of the dying person is second. If the blood were available in a bank, then you couldn't block them from receiving it. But you can't force a living breathing feeling person to give it up.

You can agree, or not, with this premise, but it's how laws currently work, except for when it comes to terminating a pregnancy. The foetus needs the support of the mother's body in order to survive, but it's still her body, and she has the right to withdraw that support.

The rights of a baby which has been born at whatever gestation should be a totally different matter.

Not RTFT but the DUP cannot vote on issues that affect England and Wales.

Scottish criminal law is dealt with by the Scottish Parliament anyway.

I am absolutely no friend of the DUP but this is a complete nonsense.

I am also militantly pro-choice and don't think any man should ever have a say on a woman's right to decide what happens with her own body.

The DUP will probably ask for lots of money for NI. Fair enough. Not so great if you live in other farflung areas of the UK, but that is not unreasonable. But they won't start asking for abortion laws in the rest of the UK to be reviewed.

Anyway we would not be in this position if people in NI didn't vote for them.

There is a lot of inaccurate Labour propaganda going on at present. TM has not announced any proposals to change abortion law.

As Boris J said earlier today everyone just needs to calm down.

@7461Mary18 It's hardly Labour propaganda, Owen Paterson said it himself!

Goodness, with MPs like that, who needs enemies, right?

Thank you for sharing your experience and opinion unbornmortificado

• says it all really

Scottish criminal law is dealt with by the Scottish Parliament anyway

Abortion is not a devolved issue. The SNP want it to be.

Thanks Tom I'm not an expert on the matter and I'm shit at wording it properly but I really hate the whole "I went through this or this happened to someone I know so my opinion counts more" it doesn't.

Excellent analysis
www.newstatesman.com/politics/staggers/2017/06/restricting-abortion-rights-unlikely-be-priority-dup-tory-pact
Paterson is NOT a minister and in 2008 he was one opposition MP who was in favour of reducing the lower limit also his statement was full of 'could' ''I suppose' and 'medical advances'
So it appears on facebook, mn, and twatter and suddenly it is re-twatted umpteen times without supposedly intelligent people doing their own fact-finding and questioning 'fake news'
I despair at the huge number of people who do not do their own research, investigate the facts and use their own brains to sort the reality of what was actually said and who said it and by what authority they said it

It's a fair point that we don't know for sure when foetuses are first capable of experiencing pain. However, since we do know that newborn babies experience pain in a similar way to adults, it seems reasonable to assume that they start develop this ability at some point before birth

I think it is pretty well understood that foetuses start of experience pain between 24-28 weeks. That is certainly what I was told by the leading fetal medicine specialist when my baby was diagnosed with catastrophic fetal abnormalities at 20 weeks, and I had to make a decision as to whether I should continue the pregnancy and leave my baby in constant horrific pain, or terminate.

Thankfully, I was able to take a few weeks to get extra tests, second opinions and have some thinking time so we didn't have to rush into a decision

A lowered limit would have taken away our ability to do all of those things, and have turned an already horrific situation into an even worse one, and probably have left us thinking 'what if' for the rest of our days, because we wouldn't have been able to get the extra tests and opinions.

As early as possible, as late as necessary. No compromise.

I am truly horrified this will be up for debate. I will state clearly it must stay as it is.
1, many medical reasons for termination are not diagnosed until after 20 weeks.
2, Abuse cases tend to present late. Would you really want to force a 12 year old child to become a mother because her mothers boyfriend raped her???? I want to give her an escape route.
3, chaotic lifestyle drug addiction alcoholism often also mean pregnancy is later to present to medical teams.
4, it gives the women more time to decide and potentially escape domestic violence that can often start in pregnancy.

It's also relatively rare away from medical reasons but no less valid
So many scenarios and reasons why we must allow termination for any women who wants / needs one. Personally I don't care what the reason is but if a Woman wants out I would support it. Better safely with good medical care rather than the old back street methods of desperation.

Also baby's below 23 weeks have low servival rate to none. They can not servive without huge amounts of medical intervention, they can't just been born and put in a warm incubator and given a bit of milk. It's highly invasive and often brutal medical intervention that forces them to survive and often long term damage is sustained

I say all and I work in neonatology. Yes I may rush to save a 24 week baby but trust me I never ever judge a women who has terminated a 24 week fetus and I never will. I see and understand more than most why a women may need to.

If you don't agree never have one and never involve yourself with it.
But please do stop and think how you would help a 12 year old who's pregnancy from abuse is only picked up at 23 weeks. That is why it's needed!

I would like to revisit the law to allow some separation between those born early and those wanting terminations.
People seem not to care that it affects women not undergoing terminations but having babies early. I can't see why both can't be catered for. Perhaps we dont count.

Headofthehive55 what does the law about abortion have to do with babies that are born early? My understanding was that the reason that interventions aren't done for very premature babies is to do with medical reasons around whether treatment is effective.

The termination law isn't actually what you should protest then head, as it's a trust to trust decision. Each case of extremely premature birth should be treated according to the baby but they have bottom lines for weight and gestation for treatment because sometimes you are just painfully prolonging the inevitable. It's a balancing act I don't envy any doctor trying to uphold. Is it ethical to put babies through invasive painful treatments for a tiny survival rate no matter what?

So now people hvae seen the quote do you now realise this is not up for debate and is typical Labour fake news!

It's not "fake news"! The comment was thrown into an interview by a Conservative MP, Owen Paterson. The issue with that is how easily and casually women's rights were thrown in as a possible bargaining chip.

I agree that the title of this thread is more alarmist than it could have been. But the basis of this is a genuine comment by a Conservative MP giving his opinion on what might be discussed with the DUP.

I'm concerned for the danger this will put vulnerable people in if the limit is reduced

There are so many cases where women do not find out they are pregnant until later on because of either being in denial or because of lack of periods due to hormonal and health causes.

If this happens to someone who was raped or abused by an ex or for many reasons, this could mean that the vulnerable women who can't face going through with their pregnancies find an alternative way without the medical assistance of NHS, BPAS, or Marie Stopes.

Late abortions are not always due to medical reasons and although very taboo, shouldn't be

to Mortificado and Cat for their experiences and to all affected by issues in this thread.

The thread has moved on a lot but just to reply to previous:

Cheers Red I appreciate the thought about ECHR and I will refer to that when I write to my MP about this. However, I am not convinced that the NI or the Westminster government care about any obligations or conventions they might currently be in violation of. There's been no previous sanction on any of them for supporting the status quo in NI.

Women's groups have lobbied successive Westminster governments about extending the 1967 abortion Act to NI for decades. Decent Parliamentarians don't need a lawyer with knowledge of ECHR to tell them that the lack of abortion rights in NI is wrong. If any one of these Lab or Tory govts had wanted to do something about it they would have done by now.

Right now while this weak minority government is forming, I think everyone should be giving a load of pushback about this. Because right now our rights are more vulnerable than before because there is every incentive for the DUP and for the Tories that women's rights can be traded on.

And whether or not Theresa May really did reassure Ruth Davidson (Leader of the Tories in Scotland, and a gay woman) that LGBT rights in mainland Britain are safe and that they would press for extension of better legal protection for gay people to NI... or whether Davidson just wants her 'on the record' as saying that..

This says to me that a) Davidson is worried enough about the DUP relationship and its perceived impact to put that 'assurance' out there on the record to the BBC
and
b) we know the Westminster Tories can't operate without the Scottish Tories' support, so this is an example that they have already begun political horse trading on social issues. the Westminster Tories just have not yet done so publicly with the DUP.

Red you also suggested to 'pick battles wisely' re the call to update the Abortion Act itself. I agree that the urgent priority is to extend abortion rights to NI. However I don't believe the 1967 Abortion Act is ideal. Equal implementation across GB and NI of the 1967 Act, would not be enough an ultimate end goal IMO.

The 1967 Act contains significant anachronism. As Cat described, needless extra hassle for women and health service resource is involved in getting and taking the medication for early abortion, because e.g. the 1967 Act did not envisage that in future there could be a safe early medical abortion procedure that women could go through at home if they chose, with medical backup.

The law should not make the actual process of having an abortion, more complex than it needs to be. It should be able to be amended to keep up with what is safe and acceptable practice, without risking any rolling back of first principles. Currently we seem to be stuck- the laws governing abortion are half a century old, and are causing problems for women but somehow it's too risky, or asking too much, to call for them to be updated.

Parliament havent actually voted on the collab of TM with DUP..they have to actually get the OK from rest of MP's before there is even a set majority government. Can't remember when they vote..but it's really possible the Tories will want to get rid of TM anyway and secure a different leader. So I still have hope she will fuck off one way or another

*majority of MP's