British Bill Would Protect Babies Born Alive After Botched Abortions

Two important Private Mebers’ Bills will be introduced in the House of Lords after they were drawn in a ballot this morning.

Lord Moylan’s Complications from Abortions (Annual Report) Bill will be introduced to the House of Lords after it was drawn in fourteenth place in the House of Lords’ Private Members’ Bill ballot and will receive a First Reading on Tuesday 9 June.

Baroness O’Loan’s Infant (Born Alive) Protection Bill was drawn at number seventeen and will receive a First Reading on Thursday 11 June.

No Bill to introduce assisted suicide was drawn in the ballot. Nor were any pro-abortion bills drawn.

How House of Lords Private Members’ Bills work

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At the beginning of each session of Parliament, two days after the State Opening of Parliament, a ballot is held to allocate the order in which the first 25 Private Members’ Bills will be introduced in the House of Lords. Usually, a large number of Peers enter the ballot, providing a short and long title of their bill for the Legislation Office. The order of the ballot determines the order in which the bills receive their First Reading in the House.

Private Members’ Bills in the Lords do not generally get enough time allocated to progress through all stages in the House of Lords, but if they do, they can then be supported by an MP and continue in the Commons.

In the Commons, Lords Private Members’ Bills do not have priority over bills introduced in the Commons, so unless the Government chooses to give them time, they rarely become law.

Peers usually use Private Members’ Bills as an opportunity to raise the profile of an important issue by having it debated in the Lords, and the campaigning and media opportunities that come with that can help them further raise the profile of that issue.

Following the profile-raising of the issue and the momentum for reform that is generated through introducing the bill in the House of Lords, a law change may then be introduced at a later date through another mechanism, such as a Private Members’ Bill in the Commons or an amendment to a Government Bill.

Peers will be finalising the contents of their Bills with the Public Bill Office, so only the title of each Bill is currently available. In the meantime, we have provided background information on the current gaps in abortion complication reporting and the strong case for making major changes to reporting, along with information on babies being born alive after abortions.

Government review shows abortion complication rates likely much higher than being reported by abortion providers

A Government review published in November 2023 revealed that abortion complication rates are likely much higher than has been previously reported in the annual abortion statistics, which are based on reporting from abortion providers.

The review, undertaken by the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID), analysed Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) for England from the years 2017 to 2021. They compared the complication rate derived from this analysis to the currently reported complication rate derived from the Abortion Notification System (ANS) based on data provided by abortion providers, which are reported in the annual abortion statistics.

The review found the ANS-derived data shows an average complication rate over the 5 years from 2017-2021 of 1.52 per 1,000 abortions, whereas their analysis of HES data over the same period showed a complication rate of 4.06, over 2.6 times higher than the ANS data that is reported in the annual abortion statistics.

When their HES data analysis also included incomplete abortions, the complication rate over the same period was 18.16, which is over 11.9 times higher than the ANS-derived complication rate that does not include incomplete abortions.

The difference in reported complication rate was much higher for women under 20 than for the general population. For women under 20, the HES-derived complication rate was 4.43 times higher than the ANS-derived complication rate, compared to 2.67 times higher for the general population. When the HES data analysis also included incomplete abortion, for under-20s the HES-derived complication rate was 17.43 times higher than the ANS-derived complication rate, compared to 11.95 times for the general population.

The review also identified that abortion providers were not recording complications that happened after discharge or after the form that they were recorded on was sent to the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC). The OHID noted that there was “no evidence” when the review was undertaken in 2022 that abortion providers were informing the (DHSC) to ensure the data was updated when a woman informed the abortion provider about a complication that occurred after the form had been sent.

The review also noted that complications may be less likely to be recorded for terminations where either both or one of the abortion medications is administered at home, because it is unlikely that the person filling in the HSA4 form will know if the woman experienced a complication following an abortion.

Babies born alive after abortion

Following a change in the law during the last parliament so that it is no longer illegal for women to perform their own abortions for any reason, including sex-selective purposes, and at any point up to and during birth, Baroness O’Loan’s Infant (Born Alive) Protection Bill aims to ensure that the law is clear regarding the protections due to babies born alive following an abortion.

The change to the law introduced earlier this year through the Crime and Policing Act 2026 will likely lead to a significant increase in the number of women performing dangerous late-term abortions at home, endangering the lives of many more women.

It will also likely lead to an increased number of viable babies’ lives being ended well beyond the 24-week abortion time limit and beyond the point at which they would be able to survive outside the womb.

Tonia Antoniazzi MP said in an interview that she was comfortable with women being able to abort a viable baby at 37 weeks.

91% of 28,000 respondents to a poll run by The Telegraph said they were opposed to the extreme law change that was subsequently made.

High numbers of babies born alive after abortions in Australian states after abortion “decriminalised”

Following law changes to “decriminalise” abortion, starting with Victoria in 2008, abortion is now allowed up to birth in all states of Australia.

State laws in Australia allow for abortion right through to birth on physical, psychological and social grounds when approved by two doctors; this can be the abortion operating surgeon and anaesthetist.

This has, in practice, allowed for de facto abortion on demand, for any reason, right through to birth in Australia.

In the state of Victoria, of 310 late-term abortions (after 20 weeks), 33 babies were born alive and subsequently died. These deaths were recorded as “neonatal deaths” rather than deaths by abortion.

In 2008, a UK report found that 66 infants were born alive after NHS terminations in one year. The majority of those 66 babies took over an hour to die.

In the state of Victoria, scores of babies have been left to die after being removed alive during a number of ‘failed’ terminations, according to one official review.

The review reported that in 2011 there were 40 ‘terminations of pregnancy’ after 20 weeks ‘resulting in live birth’. While these figures are comparable in scale, Victoria’s population of 5.5 million is just a tenth of Britain’s.

Beween 2005 and 2015, 204 babies were born alive as a result of abortions in Queensland.

Responding to there being no bills to introduce assisted suicide or expand abortion laws in the ballot, Catherine Robinson, spokesperson for Right To Life UK, said:

“It’s great to see that no pro-abortion bills were drawn in the ballot for this session. While this is a positive development, there is still the serious risk that pro-abortion MPs, backed by the abortion lobby, will try to hijack a Government Bill during this parliamentary session to introduce further extreme changes to our abortion laws”.

“Likewise, it’s great to see no bill to introduce assisted suicide has been drawn in the ballot. While this is great news, the House of Commons ballot is this Thursday, and the assisted suicide lobby, led by Dignity in Dying, a multi-million-pound pressure group, has made it clear that it is going to attempt to bring back the Leadbeater assisted suicide Bill in the next parliamentary session. It then plans to use the Parliament Acts to bypass the House of Lords and force the Bill into law”.

“It’s vital that pro-lifers around the country are ready to respond to this major threat should they be successful at persuading an MP to take forward the Leadbeater assisted suicide Bill”.

Responding to Lord Moylan’s Complications from Abortions (Annual Report) Bill being drawn in the ballot, Catherine Robinson, spokesperson for Right To Life UK, said:

“A Government review in 2023 revealed that abortion complication rates are likely much higher than has been previously reported in the annual abortion statistics, which are based on reporting from abortion providers”.

“In this new parliamentary session, the Government needs to urgently introduce measures to ensure that abortion complications data is accurately collected and reliably reported moving forward”.

“While it is rare for Lords Private Members’ Bills to become law, this Bill will ensure that the issue of complication rate underreporting is put on the radar and debated extensively in Parliament, the media and wider society. This will help raise the profile of this major issue and put pressure on the Government to ensure that abortion complications data is accurately collected and reliably reported for years to come”.

Responding to Baroness O’Loan’s Infant (Born Alive) Protection Bill being drawn in the ballot, Catherine Robinson, spokesperson for Right To Life UK, said:

“Babies born alive following an abortion should receive the same standard of care as any other baby born at the same gestation. Sadly, the fact that it is no longer illegal for women to perform their own abortions for any reason, including sex-selective purposes, and at any point up to and during birth, means that late-term abortions outside a clinical setting are far more likely. Such babies need the full protection of the law”.