Commenting on the investigation by The Independent newspaper into sex-selection abortions, Paul Tully, SPUC's general secretary, told the media today:
"Discrimination against women is being perpetuated by abortion. The pro-life movement condemns abortion as an anti-woman policy as well anti-child. However it is important to recognise that most baby girls (and boys) who are aborted are killed by doctors who pretend that the mother's mental health is at risk – and sign forms saying so. The Department of Health funds and defends these abortions, encouraging abuse of the law.Comments on this blog? Email them to johnsmeaton@spuc.org.uk
"The serious cultural prejudice against girls among a small percentage of UK citizens should not be used as a smokescreen for the ongoing slaughter of many hundreds of thousands of babies in the womb. The injustice done to all these babies is the same – death - whatever the reason.
"It is also notable that legal officials have defended the practice of sex-selection abortion in Britain by arguing that it is only illegal if there is no other 'valid' reason for the abortion.
"Last year the NHS and NHS Scotland funded the abortion of an estimated 100,000 girl babies in Britain.
"But the controversy highlights other aspects of British abortion policy too.
"The UK Department of Health has no compunction about 'lying with statistics' to defend its pro-abortion policy. For example, the department denies the evidence that there may be a link between abortion and breast cancer. There is no mention of breast cancer on the NHS "Risks of abortion" webpage http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/abortion/Pages/risks.aspx despite decades of evidence. It is therefore no surprise that the Department denied the evidence of sex-selection abortion. Since the Department of Health took over the publication of the abortion statistics from the Office for National Statistics, an independent body, all the abortion figures since then must be treated with caution.
"Whether the abortions are taking place in Britain, Asia or elsewhere, the UK government is promoting and funding them through organisations like Marie Stopes International and the British Pregnancy Advisory Service which provide industrial scale abortion services at home and abroad - and kill a few women in the process. 'Reproductive health' is one of the largest areas of spending for the UK overseas aid budget for health and it funds organisations which provide abortion.
"At home, the Department of Health does nothing to ensure that doctors observe even the lax conditions for approving abortion in the 1967 Act, and the NHS contracts out a huge number of abortions to private clinics which boast that they perform abortion on demand.
"The department is adopting a contradictory position by saying that a doctor who agrees to abort a girl-fetus because her mother doesn't want a daughter is a criminal, when in other cases a doctor who refuses to abort a woman because there are no medical grounds, is regarded by the department as guilty of unprofessional conduct. The Department of Health repeatedly insists that doctors who refuse to arrange an abortion must refer the woman to a colleague who is known to have no objection. This is an immoral and legally unfounded demand."
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