Sex selective abortion - SNP review of Scottish law

[ArabellaSaurus]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/11/14/abortions-based-on-sex-legalised-plans-snp/

'a report commissioned by the Scottish Government recommends ...establishing an automatic right to an abortion and listing a set of scenarios where it would not be allowed.
The expert review published on Friday said any future legislation should not include any explicit prohibition on sex-selective abortion.
Prof Annie Glasier, who chaired the review, said that the group believed it was “unnecessary” and “potentially harmful” to explicitly prohibit the practice.

She said there was a lack of evidence of it taking place in Scotland, adding that enforcing it would also be difficult because it would require “intrusive and inappropriate questioning” of those seeking an abortion.
She also raised concerns that it would risk “racial profiling” women from particular communities where sex-selective abortion is thought to take place.'

The Review:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/review-abortion-law-scotland-expert-group-report/pages/5/

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/abortion-on-grounds-of-sex-of-the-foetus

Gov research data

Well we know which sex will be terminated.

So deal with the issue of the oppression of women. We know exactly which sex will be terminated.

I genuinely don’t understand how you’d stop it. If abortion is legal, then people will abort babies they don’t want for any reason. You can’t fact check anyone and you can’t force someone to give birth as they happen to be carrying a girl. What exactly would the plan be to avoid this (and obviously agree it’s terrible)?

Yes, overall, it's the argument for whether or not to legalise abortion, rather than the current state of 'illegal but allowed in specific circumstances'. It seems a bit more complex than one might expect on the fact of it.

An objective can be to stop providers offering a service of sex testing with an aim to abort the "wrong" sex similar to how "designer babys" can not be a service provision option in the UK.

There may be red flags.

I would imagine woman at 12+ weeks (been assigned pregnancy notes and all, may have seen on scan) turning up to terminate with hubby in tow. Not really unplanned, and a sudden change of heart doesn’t ring true.

But I don’t think you can prevent really. If a woman/couple is determined to terminate, they will just lie. The exception is for women being coerced who speak up and ask for help.

Regardless, it should remain forbidden to send a message that it isn’t acceptable.

Exactly this! A tacit acceptance that it is in fact recorded at birth not assigned. I have always wondered how the midwives decide on the assignment -all girls on a Tuesday, take it in turns, rock paper scissors lizard spock 🤔 Really we should be told

Pro-choice people seem to get upset about sex selective abortion when it targets girls but the funny thing is beyond that, barely anyone talks about the baby at all even though boys and girls get aborted all the time. The foetus doesn't know any different. They suddenly become pro-life in that one specific scenario. What about all the boys that are aborted? Or what about the abortions because a woman wants to further her career?

My friend didn't grow up in the West and one thing she said to me recently was why is it that Western civilisation prioritises the wellbeing of women over children. For all of my life I've mostly thought of women's rights in relation to men, not in relation to children. Ever since she said this I've looked at lots of things through that lens. Eg, if a mum has an OnlyFans and she says that she does it because it's 'empowering' I think "but what about your kids? Is it empowering for them?"

Another thing. I know a woman who will say she's pro choice purely because she cares about women and girls. Fine, but if you don't care about boys why on earth do you expect them to give a rats about you?

Something is not adding up here.

Whilst sex selective abortion is certainly immoral, the trade off for many of these women who are complicit is they won't be forced to continually have children until they conceive a boy.

And the thing is if you truly believe abortion isn't murder as the unborn have not achieved personhood prior to viability as I do, the reasoning for wanting one shouldn't matter.

That's what you'd have to do to try and tackle this, though obviously it wouldn't prevent women from travelling or potentially even sending samples to providers abroad. But it would make more sense to start there instead of trying to tinker with abortion laws or procedures to prevent it.

The way to "tinker" is a clause which makes it a crime to carry out a process to abort the baby on that basis and/or to provide a sex test for that sole reason.

And to make it a crime for a third party (father or others) to try force the woman into the situation.

The likelyhood of a woman being convicted would be low.

Providers of sex testing cant sell it as a product and get a confirmation in the sign up process that the applicant is aware that it is a criminal offence and issue a warning that the sex test could be used as evidence in any court case.

And to make it a crime for a third party (father or others) to try and force the woman into the situation

Do you mean make it a crime to try and force a woman to have an abortion? Or only make it a crime to try and force a woman to have a sex selective abortion?

(I know this currently isn’t specifically illegal but could it come under coercive behaviour laws maybe?)

Everyone is looking at this the wrong way around. The solution is not to ban the abortion (or ask questions about it etc) but instead to ban the early-term sex tests.

I can't see any legitimate necessary reason parents need to know the sex of the pregnancy before the anomaly scan, beyond idle curiosity.

If we ban the early-term sex tests, then sex-selective abortion becomes impossible but abortion on other grounds is still possible.

An exception could be made (and I think already is) for sex-specific inheritable disorders

Said tinkering with the abortion laws won't achieve the objective. The abortion provider just won't be told the real reason.

You have to try and address the availability of the tests. Some women would still access testing outside the UK one way or another, but that's not something we can hope to prevent with domestic legislation. The focus would need to be on early testing access here. There are already laws preventing forced abortion, which we all know don't work as well as we'd hope but again the key is to try and prevent the knowledge that would lead to the forces abortion being gained in the first place.

I’ve only just stumbled across this thread and I’ve been taken aback by it.

I have always been aware of sex selection practices in some cultures (which I find horrific) and gender disappointment in others (which I have encountered as disappointment initially but soon overcome upon birth). What is new to me is a kind of consumeristic mindset that suggests people have the right to select a specific type of baby.

I have concerns for ‘selected babies’ in relation to the parents’ prescribed expectations of them by dint of them being a boy or a girl. My hope is that, the freedom of choice that parents exercise to get the sex of their choosing, extends to their child having freedom of choice to live their lives as they choose and not in line with some pre-imagined sexist notions that their parents had at conception.

The abortion provider just won't be told the real reason.

Correct as I said its unlikely to result in a woman being charged with a crime

Rather if the provider is told or suspects the reason the provider would have a legal obligation to refuse to provide the service.

You have to try and address the availability of the tests. Some women would still access testing outside the UK one way or another, but that's not something we can hope to prevent with domestic legislation. The focus would need to be on early testing access here.

Not exactly correct if the UK was to legislate against the sex test it is easy to enact legislation to allow a criminal charge for out of State act of sex testing and sex selection abortion. That could result in women who used out if State services being charged on the purchase of the service or being charged for travel out of State to obtain an abortion.

There are already laws preventing forced abortion, which we all know don't work as well as we'd hope but again the key is to try and prevent the knowledge that would lead to the forces abortion being gained in the first place.

The legislation would be about reduction rather than reaching zero events and would have to have a provision to allow the CPS to weigh the evidence "winable" and still not charge.

But like any change in law the political will has to be there to craft fair and reasoned law and I think in the end of the day the lawmakers would not be willing to propose changes to prevent sex testing.

I think the current legislation wording makes it unlawful to arrange an abortion and from memory the wording would (in theory anyway) allow the CPS to charge any third party.
But will have to reread it to be sure

Reasons are sometimes lied about or are hard to ascertain. This does not mean any reason should be acceptable. If a couple want a child but will abort any girls until they get a boy that is disgusting. Anyone thinking like that probably shouldn't be a parent at all. The pragmatic approach is to keep such a reason illegal such that it is clear that such attitudes are fundamentally unacceptable in our society.

Any changes to legally allow this will result in a trend for parents to select the sex of their child.

Just pretend, for a moment, that even women are real humans: No, not reproductive systems. People. People with equal rights, including rights to control their fertility, exactly like the male people can:

So, they don't have to beg anyone for sterilisation, do they? They have no 'owner', who might have been keeping them only for use of their reproductive systems, and who will be deprived of his full use of his property, if females were permitted to make their own choices, whenever they wish, to stop reproducing.

Just pretend, too, that there are billlions too many humans on the planet to be sustained, so every extra human is an unbearable load for everyone else, for all biodiversity, for any hope of recovering our once perfectly balanced, beautiful, ecologically sustainable, biodiverse world. If there was really any such thing as a population explosion, every extra planned or unplanned human would not really be a viable entirely personal choice, because of the effect on others, would it?

But, above all, unwanted pregnancies are truly reprehensible. For whatever reason the woman has, for wanting to stop, it is torture to force her to continue to term with any pregnancy.

Has the father started hitting her? Has she discovered he intends to use the infant for the entertainment and income to be derived from abusing it?

Has she found out he is a hopeless gambler, whose enormous debts are in her name? Is he using drugs? Has he got other 'wives' and families?

Has she, herself, realised she is addicted and/ or alcoholic and the baby will be damaged?

Has she simply gone off the idea, realising that a baby is not just a cute new toy for Christmas? If she was a real person, wouldn't it be sensible to allow, and encourage, an end to all continued pregnancy?

The baby P case was the eighth, with a previous seven 'in care'. The Martin case was coincidentally also the eighth, also with a previous seven 'in care':

Just suppose reproduction was not somehow 'sanctified' as the only purpose for a female to exist: Suppose that there were no societal or financial incentives to encourage it, nor any legal or medical impediment to stopping it.... Could anyone imagine that? It would be a perfectly normal situation, but only if females were real people.

That post sounds like a weird advert. Totally unconnected to the discussion, at all.

Shades of Malthus. Women are real people. I am one. I am a person. Anyone who thinks women are not full people is, at best, weird (at worst a raging misogynist who can't read/member of the Taliban and their ilk). That, however, does not make abortion on demand a good idea. Abortion - which I am sure I have said somewhere - in the UK was seen as a last resort to help women with abusive partners, women living in poverty with already too many children, women who had been raped or the victims of incest. And (rape and incest apart) it was assumed that as prosperity increased and as women's rights increased also, along with reliable contraception, abortion would decrease, not increase. Something has gone wrong with society if just deciding it's not going to be fun raising a child is a good reason for abortion. And cases such as Baby P are not usuable as reasons for abortion either. He happened to be an eighth child, others who have suffered similar abuse were the first or second. It is mixing categories to suggest that child abuse is a reason for abortion on demand - it's also a deeply suspect argument from eugenics.

https://www.thetimes.com/article/19f4b7fb-96f2-4dd3-a151-6c928e2fc96d?shareToken=9319a76fa682a6b40a331d9bab40a7d5

Britain’s leading abortion charity, which provides terminations for the NHS, has been labelled “irresponsible” by campaigners for stating that sex-selective terminations are not illegal.

The Department of Health and Social Care’s (DHSC) most recent figures show that women of Indian origin had a sex ratio for their first and second child which was similar to the national average of 105 boys to 100 girls. On the birth of their third child, however, there is a significant imbalance, as this ratio then rose to 113 boys to 100 girls. Between 2017 and 2021, the DHSC report estimates that approximately 400 sex-selective abortions have taken place towards female foetuses.

The DHSC said in a statement: “This government’s position is unequivocal: sex-selective abortion is illegal in England and Wales and will not be tolerated.

“Sex is not a lawful ground for termination of pregnancy, and it is a criminal offence for any practitioner to carry out an abortion for that reason alone.

I think this is at the limits of individual freedom of choice.
The sex ratio is of huge importance to society as a whole. Nature designed 50:50 though slightly more boys whohave a lower survival rate than girls in the natural world.
Society has an interest in this being maintained. A preference for sex indicates a fixed idea of sex stereotypes.
Having just read 'Brave New World' again I'm pessimistic at our attempts to push individualistic, consumerism to the extreme.