The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) the UK's largest pro-life group, condemned the call by the leadership of the Royal College of Midwives for widening of the abortion law today.
Paul Tully, General Secretary of SPUC said: "Midwifery is a caring profession, and most women training to be midwives do so because they care about babies and want to serve mothers and babies. Abortion is a total contradiction of that. Abortion kills babies and harms women, sometimes fatally.
"Radical killing ideology"
"The RCM's new abortion statement marks a further shift of the union towards the radical killing ideology of the pro-abortion lobby. Currently, most abortions performed in labour wards are on babies with disabilities like Down's Syndrome or spina bifida. This has a damaging effect on the doctors, midwives and nurses involved, causing many of them long-term regret, but in a few cases making them radical advocates for killing. In future, the pro-abortion RCM wants to make it legal to kill any baby at any stage without any reason.
"Expectant mothers have a right to express a preference for how they are treated, and one thing they can do is ask to be treated by a midwife who does not subscribe to the pro-abortion RCM. They can make this request early in their pregnancy. They don't have to wait till they are in labour. RCM has politicised the role of midwives by supporting change in the law to allow the killing of more babies, but mothers have a right to object. Just as women would be entitled to ask not to be treated by members of a group that supported the killing of black people or disabled people, so they have all the more right to ask to be treated by someone who does not kill unborn children", concluded Mr Tully.
Notes for editors
SPUC funded a legal appeal by senior midwives Mary Doogan and Connie Wood from Glasgow who went to the Supreme Court in 2014 to explain why they refused to supervise abortion. The RCM intervened against the midwives to argue that if they did not want to help kill an unborn child themselves, they should be forced to tell other midwives do so. The court found against Mary and Connie and in favour of the pro-abortion RCM.
Jade Rees, the 21-year-old mother of a toddler, committed suicide three weeks after her "safe legal" abortion in November 2015. Aisha Chithira came to England in 2012 and was killed by a late "safe legal" abortion at an Ealing, west London, clinic. Jessie Barlow died after a "safe legal" drug-induced BPAS abortion in 2011. Their babies died too of course. It is likely that many deaths following abortion are not identified as such, because abortions are not required to be recorded on the woman's medical records.
For more detailed comments or to request an interview with SPUC, please contact SPUC's Communications Department on: