I understand women’s pain — but decriminalising abortion crosses a line, writes Shelagh Fogarty

18 June 2025, 15:52 | Updated: 19 June 2025, 10:35

By Shelagh Fogarty

@shelaghfogarty

The vote to decriminalise abortion to term goes far beyond protecting women in crisis.

There are moments on my programme where I feel the need to say something upfront – not to soften the argument, but to make it clear I understand the nuance and the pain that often sit behind these issues. This is one of those moments.

I'm talking about abortion – and in particular, about the vote in the Commons that effectively decriminalised abortion in England and Wales in all circumstances, right up to birth. No woman, no matter how advanced her pregnancy, will now face criminal prosecution for ending it. And while some will see that as progress, I can’t be the only one left deeply troubled.

Let me say first what I’ve said many times before: I understand, in part because of the callers to this programme, just how complex and agonising a pregnancy can be. I remember vividly a caller named Sarah from Bristol. Well into the final stages of pregnancy, she found herself in a state of deep psychological distress – dissociated, traumatised, desperate not to be pregnant another day. She needed urgent, specialist medical help, and she got it. Her story changed how I thought about late-term abortion, because it brought the reality of mental and emotional collapse into sharp, human focus.

So yes, I understand the argument for removing criminal sanctions in such cases. I understand how the law, until now, may have compounded the suffering of women like Sarah. But here's where I struggle. Yesterday’s vote didn’t just protect women in rare and tragic situations like hers. It removed all criminal penalties, even for abortions carried out without medical supervision, even at 35, 38 or 39 weeks.

To call it a “procedure” at that point is misleading. We are talking about the ending of a fully developed life – a baby with arms, legs, lungs, a heartbeat, a future. At that stage, the difference between a pregnancy and a birth is geography. The baby is either inside the womb or outside it. The dependency on adult care is the same. And yet we’ve now drawn a legal line that says ending that life – at home, alone, without medical oversight – carries no legal consequence for the mother.

Some will say it’s a vanishingly rare scenario. But rarity alone shouldn’t end a moral conversation. We don’t design laws solely around how often something happens. We design them around what we believe is right.

The decision to decriminalise abortion up to birth makes me profoundly uncomfortable. I’m not here to relitigate the entire debate. The 24-week limit is the settled will of Parliament and, I think, of most people in this country. I have no issue with decriminalising abortion up to 24 weeks. But beyond that? We are in a very different ethical place. This is not an arbitrary number. It reflected a moral and medical balancing act between the rights of the woman and the developing life inside her. By removing criminal sanctions entirely, even for non-medical abortions in the final weeks of pregnancy, we have, in effect, said that the latter has no value at all.

And let’s be honest about something else. Not every woman is a Sarah. Not every woman will be in psychological collapse or supported by professionals. Not every woman is good, or kind, or safe. If a mother killed her baby the day after it was born, we wouldn’t wave it off as a bad day. We wouldn’t ignore it because “she’s the mother.” We would ask serious questions – and rightly so.

We do it in other areas. When it comes to assisted dying – or more accurately, assisted suicide – we still maintain legal boundaries because of the potential for abuse, for pressure, for quiet coercion. And that debate involves adults who have a voice, and often a terminal diagnosis. In this case, the baby has no voice. No legal standing. No protection.

I know this is difficult. I know that pain and panic and trauma don’t obey neat timelines. But this law change worries me – not because I’m blind to the suffering of women, but because I cannot look away from the life at the heart of it all. A viable baby, days or weeks from birth, deserves more than silence from the law.

If you disagree with me, if you think I’m overreacting, I’ll leave you with this question: what, truly, is the moral difference between a baby at the start of the birth canal and the same baby at the end of it?

I can’t see one.

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Listen to LBC's Shelagh Fogarty from 1-4pm Monday to Friday on the new LBC app.

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