To ask pro-choice MNers to email your MPs? <this is not a request to vote on anything>

[EricNorthmansMistressOfPotions]

There is an article here about the proposed amendments to the health and social care bill which will force women to undergo 'independent' counselling before being allowed to choose to terminate a pregnancy. The assumption is that BPAS and the like have a financial investment in encouraging women to terminate and as such their counselling is biased. The stated goal is to reduce the number of terminations per year by forcing women to delay between seeking and receiving termination, and having to undergo additional counselling (political bias unknown, though easily guessed at) prior to the termination. ND hopes that woman will change their minds during this enforced extended waiting period.

If you think this is a shit idea you can email your MP by clicking this link

This is not a request to vote on anything at all

Bumbley....Are you Dorries?

shurely Dorries is busy blogging and agitating about the immorality of our benighted teenage girls??

Just to check also - at no point did these women have any sort of telephone support or advice from a healthcare professional, telling them what to do, how to tie and cut the cord, etc, etc?

They had absolutely zero assistance from the onset of labour, to delivering the baby and afterwards?

None? Not a layperson, no-one on the telephone at any point? Nothing?

Thanks OP, I emaille.d

You are jumping to conclusions biwi. I am using those definitions because they exist - not because I've come up with them myself with some sneaky agenda to be unpleasant and misleading. I have also referred to a c-section as a medical procedure and ventuose and forceps deliveries are considered medical interventions even though they too can be included in the 'giving birth' definition although not 'natural delivery'. I'm sure you are well aware of that but you are purposely trying to twist it into something unpleasant that you can accuse me of.

i think it's a shame that so few people see the benefit of counselling being offered. Abortion as we are discussing it is never medically necessary and surely there are emotional and even ethical decisions involved for most people considering it.

I was offered counselling when I underwent IVF, a procedure that is also not medically necessary and involves ethical considerations. I didn't feel offended by that offer and indeed took it up. An even bigger decision I was considering later on was becoming an egg recipient. I read as much as I could about other people's experiences, and discussed it with friends and family, but I think i ultimately would have needed to discuss it with someone impartial who didn't know me. (ended up getting pregnant naturally so never came to pass.)

I imagine people considering kidney donation and other non-mandatory medical procedures (including cosmetice surgery) are also offered counselling.

I think women's right to abortion is firmly enough entrenched in our law and culture to allow for a minimal adjustment to help women make what is often a tough decision.

Sorry posie I didn't understand the wording in the first line of your second paragraph but agree that we should look at how women are viewed as a whole in society - I believe this was briefly touched on earlier wrt adoption. I do have to say though that I don't think the point of the proposed counselling is to persecute and coerce women. That is why the 'independent' aspect needs to be independent.

"i think it's a shame that so few people see the benefit of counselling being offered."

There'd be much more benefit if the counselling came from an experienced area, rather than a pro-life biased perspective.

No one has been against counselling, they have been against

• forced counselling
• adding another barrier to getting abortions
• forcing more women to have later term abortions
• pro-life organisations who have demonstrated that they will do anything they can into guilting women out of abortions having any power

Tilly, no - no one! I was pretty shocked actually. One of them wasn't too long ago - 3rd baby. DH out with older kids. She was home by herself and felt the familiar twinges and thought she had a while but it came much faster than she expected! She said it was one BIG contraction and the head was there crowning and then there he was! No problems with placenta and she didn't have to go in to hospital. I'm sure someone probably came out to see her and tick some boxes but it was a completely unassisted birth. She's clearly superwoman!

Empusa - that is a series of assumptions. The actual proposal is about non-compulsory counselling that wouldn't delay the process. does anyone really think the public and politicians would tolerate pro-life organisations being in charge of any subsequent counselling?

chandellina many, many people on this thread have said that it would be a fantastic thing if more counselling were offered (including me).

What we're doubting is the quality and independence of the counselling produced by the kind of model Dorries is advocating.

As I said further down, and others have said too, if Dorries were advocating more independent government funding for counselling and support I would be here with pom poms. She's not. If the government truly thinks counselling is essential then it should put its money where its mouth is and cough up. What Dorries is proposing devolves the issue to allow some vested interest groups access to vulnerable women, while purposely excluding other groups from the arena.

Erm , counselling was always on offer but from agencies that were womancentric and not pro life.,

Empusa, but where does it say that any of those things WILL happen? People are just jumping to conclusions based on nothing more than a dislike for this Dorries woman (who is not me btw pp (I would put a smiley here but they don't seem to go down too well) ) and/or a dislike for the Tories in general.

bumbley to be fair it really isn't just 'dislike' of Dorries. She has form as a US-style abstinence enthusiast and Christian Right sympathiser. She isnt' just some well-meaning do-gooder believe me.

and you do know that women seeking abortions have the choice to get counselling already??? Probably from their GPs if they asked for it.

no one needs pro-life groups involved in counselling.

i can unequivocally say that no one offered me any form of counselling for my abortion. Not my GP and not Marie Stopes.

I think it's based on more than just a dislike of her, and more to do with knowledge of what she has already said.

What do you think the point of this proposal is? Bearing in mind counselling is already available. If it's just about offering counselling, then it makes no sense. It'd be like campaigning for a national health service, it's already there.

What would you say Dorries is trying to achieve?

Empusa, I don't know much about her personally so I would take the proposal at face value and think that the intent is to ensure that a woman gets independent (on both sides) advice, that she has the opportunity to discuss all the options and to ensure that she is making an informed choice and that she is content with the decision she has made.

That has always been the case though. They haven't been denying people access to counselling.

Goodnightmoon, you seem to be invisible to people again I'm afraid. Clearly your experience makes people uncomfortable because it doesn't fit into their idea of the way things are/should be.

Newsflash! No 10 u-turn - they are now advising MPs to vote against the Dorries amendments. Cameron Clegg etc will vote against her proposals. Just posted at the Guardian

Well it would seem that they don't always offer it either. Didn't chandellina say earlier the proposal was to make it compulsory for GPS to offer it not compulsory for women to take it?

goodnightmoon's experience is awful, and should never have happened. But it isn't the standard.

eightieschick That's good news!

goodnightmoon a dear friend of mine recently had a termination at Marie Stopes and was offered counselling. I'm really sorry to hear that you weren't.

eightieschick that's good.