MPs want to overhaul Victorian abortion law used to jail woman
‘Women should not be criminalised for a medical procedure’: MPs are told to overhaul ‘terrifying’ Victorian law used to jail mother-of-three who ended her pregnancy in lockdown – but pro-life groups demand an end to ‘DIY pills-by-post abortions’
Parliament should consider overhauling abortion laws as a priority after a woman was jailed for terminating her pregnancy at 32 to 34 weeks, senior female MPs said today, with campaigners demanding the procedure is completely decriminalised because the threat is ‘archaic’ and ‘terrifying’ for women.
Caroline Nokes, the Conservative who chairs the Commons Women and Equalities Committee, has joined women’s rights groups in calling for reform to the 1861 legislation used to prosecute Carla Foster.
Ms Foster, from the Staffordshire village of Barlaston, lied about how advanced her pregnancy was in order to obtain abortion-causing drugs. She was between 32 and 34 weeks pregnant when she received the medication from the British Pregnancy Advisory Service under the ‘pills by post’ scheme, which pro-life campaigners believe is inhumane and should be banned.
The 44-year-old was given a 28-month extended prison sentence yesterday.
Tory MP Ms Nokes said: ‘I think that makes a case for Parliament to start looking at this issue in detail’.
But the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, the largest and oldest pro-life group in the UK, has hit back by saying: ‘Surely the death of a baby of eight months exposes the complete inadequacy of the safeguards for this regime of abortion?’
Carla Foster, 44, arrives at Stoke Crown Court for her sentencing hearing yesterday. She was jailed for 28 months. Her case has sparked debate about Britain’s abortion laws
Mandu Reid, leader of the Women’s Equality Party, told LBC: ‘Abortion should not be subject to criminal law. They (abortions) should be regulated. I’m not saying there should be zero regulation. But you can’t allow a situation where the patient can be criminalised.
READ MORE: ‘No one has the right to judge you’: Mother-of-three, 44, posts Facebook message before she is jailed
‘We have to have long, cold hard look about why we still allow a Victorian era law to prevail in the 21st century when just across the way in Northern Ireland we have done away with that’.
Abortions are generally only legal before 24 weeks and are carried out in clinics after 10 weeks of pregnancy.
Dame Diana Johnson, the chair of the Commons Home Affairs Committee, urged the Government to ‘step up’ and decriminalise abortions so women cannot be jailed in such cases.
Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court heard Foster was sent the drugs by the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) after she lied about how far along in her pregnancy she was during 2020’s pandemic lockdown.
The prosecution said Foster made a number of internet searches between February and May 2020, including ‘how to hide a pregnancy bump’, ‘how to have an abortion without going to the doctor’ and ‘how to lose a baby at six months’.
Foster was initially charged with child destruction and pleaded not guilty.
She later pleaded guilty to an alternative charge of section 58 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861, administering drugs or using instruments to procure abortion, which was accepted by the prosecution.
The sentencing has prompted a backlash.
Foster eventually pleaded guilty to a charge under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861
Carla Foster lied about how advanced her pregnancy was to obtain abortion-causing drugs
Ms Nokes told BBC Radio 4’s World Tonight programme: ‘This is not something that has been debated in any great detail for many years now.
Reaction to sentencing of Carla Foster for inducing late abortion
‘Society has moved on, healthcare has moved on, and I think Parliament has a role now to look at reforming our abortion laws. There’s no other country in the world as I understand it that would criminalise a woman in this way.’
Dame Diana Johnson, Labour MP and Commons Home Affairs Committee chairwoman
‘This is not something that has been debated in any great detail for many years now. And cases like this, although tragic and fortunately very rare, do throw into stark relief that we are reliant on legislation that is very, very out of date.’
Caroline Nokes, Conservative MP and Commons Women and Equalities Committee chairwoman
‘No other healthcare procedure has such a status. No other patient group would be treated this way. It’s time to change law and trust women.
Stella Creasy, Labour MP
‘No woman can ever go through this again. There has never been a clearer mandate for parliamentary action, and the need has never been so urgent.’
Clare Murphy, British Pregnancy Advisory Service chief executive
‘This is a tremendously sad story and underscores the desperate need for legal reform in relation to reproductive health’
Chiara Capraro, Amnesty International UK women’s human rights programme director
‘What possible purpose is served in criminalising and imprisoning this woman, when at most she needs better access to healthcare and other support?’
Harriet Wistrich, Centre for Women’s Justice director
‘This whole terrible event took place during the pandemic and people were making some terrible choices during that period that perhaps they regret now’
Nazir Afzal, former chief crown prosecutor for the North West
‘Our laws as they stand balance a woman’s right to access safe and legal abortions with the rights of an unborn child. I’m not aware of any plans to address that approach.’
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s official spokesman
‘BPAS is now cynically using this woman’s tragic experience of using their abortion service to lobby the Government to introduce extreme abortion legislation throughout the United Kingdom’
Catherine Robinson, Right To Life UK spokesperson
‘The responsibility for this tragedy lies firmly with pro-abortion campaigning organisations that promote an up-to-birth abortion culture and facilitated this dangerous and illegal abortion’
Andrea Williams, Christian Concern chief executive
‘Surely the death of a baby of eight months exposes the complete inadequacy of the safeguards for this regime of abortion?’
Society for the Protection of Unborn Children spokesperson
‘We need to revisit the pills by post scheme, and make sure that no more women are harmed by it, and that abortion providers are properly held to account for allowing this kind of thing to happen.’
Emily Hawkins, communications director of Alliance of Pro-Life Students.
‘And cases like this, although tragic and fortunately very rare, do throw into stark relief that we are reliant on legislation that is very, very out of date.
Dame Diana said both society and healthcare have ‘moved on’ since the existing abortion laws were put in place.
The Labour MP told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘I think Parliament has a role now to look at reforming our abortion laws. There’s no other country in the world, as I understand it, that would criminalise a woman in this way.
‘The Government should step up and say we should decriminalise, we should reform abortion law, take the criminal law out of this, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have regulation.’
Former chief crown prosecutor for the North West Nazir Afzal also argued it was not in the public interest to prosecute the mother-of-three.
Citing public feeling towards laws restricting abortions and her mitigating factors, he told Today: ‘Had I been involved, had I been doing this particular case, I would not have prosecuted it.
‘This whole terrible event took place during the pandemic and people were making some terrible choices during that period that perhaps they regret now. And I think that’s one of the things I would have factored in in relation to this particular case.’
Centre for Women’s Justice director Harriet Wistrich was also among those questioning whether the prosecution was in the public interest.
‘What possible purpose is served in criminalising and imprisoning this woman, when at most she needs better access to healthcare and other support?’ she said.
‘She is clearly already traumatised by the experience and now her children will be left without their mother for over a year.
‘When most forms of violence against women and girls go unpunished this sentence confirms our very worst fears about contemporary attitudes to women’s basic human rights and an utterly misdirected criminal justice system.’
Women’s human rights programme director at Amnesty International UK Chiara Capraro said the decision to prosecute was ‘shocking and quite frankly terrifying’.
‘This is a tremendously sad story and underscores the desperate need for legal reform in relation to reproductive health,’ she said.
BPAS chief executive Clare Murphy said ‘no woman can ever go through this again’ and called for MPs to protect women in desperate circumstances so they are never threatened with prison.
‘Vulnerable women in the most incredibly difficult of circumstances deserve more from our legal system,’ she said.
The Crown Prosecution Service said the case was ‘complex and traumatic’, but said it has a duty to ensure laws are ‘properly considered and applied when making difficult charging decisions’.
The court heard Foster, who had three sons before becoming pregnant again in 2019, did not see a doctor about her pregnancy because she was ’embarrassed’ and did not know how far along she was.
She spoke to a BPAS nurse practitioner in May 2020 and was sent abortion pills in the post after it was determined she was only around seven weeks pregnant based on her answers.
A post-mortem examination determined the child was between 32 and 34 weeks’ gestation when born.
Her cause of death was recorded as stillbirth and maternal use of abortion drugs.
Foster will serve 14 months in custody and the remainder on licence after her release.
Sentencing judge Mr Justice Pepperall said: ‘This case concerns one woman’s tragic and unlawful decision to obtain a very late abortion.
‘The balance struck by the law between a woman’s reproductive rights and the rights of her unborn foetus is an emotive and often controversial issue. That is, however, a matter for Parliament and not for the courts.’
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