Pro-life groups are urging Scottish First Minister John Swinney to rule out any change that would allow abortion up to the point of birth.
The move comes after a leaked Scottish National Party conference motion called for removing criminal penalties so that a woman could have an abortion for any reason, including sex selection, at any point up to and during birth.
The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children said a draft motion seeking to implement recommendations of the Scottish Abortion Law Reform Expert Group would wipe away the current 24-week legal limit. Abortion in Scotland is now permitted up to 24 weeks and after that only in exceptional medical circumstances.
Click Follow below to like the LifeNews Facebook page!
“This draft conference motion represents a radical and deeply disturbing shift in the SNP’s direction,” said John Deighan, chief executive of SPUC. “While previous conference resolutions supported access up to the current 24-week legal limit, this new proposal attempts to hijack the party’s platform to push through extreme recommendations from an ideological ‘Expert Group’ that wants abortion completely decriminalised.”
“Removing abortion from the criminal law altogether means removing the 24-week legal ceiling,” Deighan said. “It would leave Scotland with one of the most extreme abortion laws in the world, allowing viable, late-term unborn babies to be aborted right up to birth.”
Deighan said Swinney should show “true leadership” and “clearly rule out” any measure that would permit abortion up to the point of birth.
The leaked draft agenda for the SNP’s October conference is not a finalized list of what will be debated. The motion asks members to note “with concern that at present, Scotland is the only part of the UK” that has not “remove[d] legal penalties from women under the 1967 Abortion Act,” and says a woman performing her own abortion should be “rooted in human rights and equality of access, not criminal law.”
If adopted as party policy, it could be taken forward in government or championed at Westminster.
A 2025 review commissioned by then-First Minister Humza Yousaf recommended that Scotland scrap the 24-week time limit and allow abortions on social grounds, including for sex-selective purposes, right up to birth.
“It is disheartening that, according to this leaked document, the Scottish National Party is considering making such an extreme position on abortion party policy,” said Catherine Robinson of Right To Life UK. “If adopted, this policy could become law and lead to the lives of many more women being endangered because of the risks involved with self-administered late-term abortions and also tragically 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.”
“Pressure must now be put on the SNP to drastically change their course ahead of their Party Conference in October,” she said.
Public Health Scotland figures show 18,783 babies killed in abortions in Scotland in 2025, the highest on record. SPUC said official figures suggest abortion is now the leading cause of death in Scotland.
There were 277 disability-selective abortions in 2025.
Right To Life UK cited polling showing 89% of the public and 91% of women agree gender-selective abortion should be explicitly banned by law, and that only 1% of women support introducing abortion up to birth.
The most common abortion time limit among European Union countries is 12 weeks.
