My Lords, I have attached my name to this amendment, which has support on Benches across the House. In moving this amendment, the noble Baroness described exactly what this is: a power that the Government could and should take unto themselves in order to use it if necessary. Why do we think it might be necessary? “We” includes the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, the Royal College of Midwives and the Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare—all the providers and people within the health service who know this piece of work better than anybody else. Why do we need it? As of this morning, 25% of BPAS clinics are closed because they do not have the staff to open.
That means things are becoming much more difficult for women. Yesterday, women in York needed to travel two miles to secure an earlier medical abortion. As of today, they will have to travel 40 miles.
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Multiple NHS services are not providing. They have reduced staffing—we all know and understand that—and are having to reduce opening times. Some are not taking women unless they have a referral from a GP. Can noble Lords imagine what a GP’s day is like in current circumstances? There has been a drastic decline in the capacity to provide surgical abortions, because operating theatres are being used for ICU and urgent cases. Women with serious underlying medical conditions are told to isolate for 12 weeks, yet, if we do not change this, 4,000 will have to make weekly journeys—increasingly long journeys in some parts of the country. This morning France introduced telemedical care for abortion to deal with the pandemic. Telemedical care just for this purpose is supported by all the organisations I mentioned earlier. Remote provision is ruled safe by the World Health Organization.
In this Bill, some of us have conceded points that we think to be fundamentally important to our way of life. For example, we have agreed that people will be incarcerated for mental health reasons on the say-so of just one doctor. I will not rehearse the discussion we had yesterday, but time after time there were speeches in which Members of the House said, “In normal circumstances I cannot do that, but I have to”.
This is the situation in week three. Imagine what the situation will be like in week seven when we are back—if Parliament comes back. This is necessary and urgent. It not only affects the lives of the women concerned but has a huge impact on NHS staff and the rest of society. I therefore strongly urge the Government to accept this proposal.