‘I felt like a criminal’: Record number of women facing illegal abortion investigations
Sarah’s front room is filled with pictures of her smiling baby. He’s now 18 months old. But for almost a year, she was investigated on suspicion of illegally trying to abort him.
In January 2023, Sarah (not her real name) had just delivered her baby prematurely. She called 999 but before paramedics turned up, police came knocking at her door.
“The front room was just full of police,” Sarah tells Sky News. “I felt like a criminal.”
Her pregnancy was unplanned and she had considered a termination. She went to an abortion clinic but was told she was three days over the legal limit of 24 weeks.
“I wasn’t expecting to be that far gone,” she says. “I was hardly showing. It was a massive shock.”
When she got home, she panicked and started searching adoption, and adoption to friends and family, online. She even put abortion pills in her online shopping basket – but never bought them.
After a few days, Sarah came to terms with the pregnancy. But on the Monday morning, she wasn’t feeling very well and called in sick to work.
“Throughout the day, I’d had back pain and wasn’t getting any better,” she says. “And then at about seven in the evening, eight maybe, I went upstairs to the toilet… and he was here.
“I rang my husband who was downstairs to say ‘I think I’ve just had a baby’.”
He was born at 25 weeks, almost three months premature. He wasn’t breathing. His parents wrapped him in a towel and took him downstairs.
“He was blue in colour, there was no movement. It was horrible,” Sarah says.
Sarah (right) told Sky News she’s still traumatised by the year-long investigation
When her husband rang 999, the paramedics gave CPR instructions on the phone. But before they arrived, the police came.
It was the start of an investigation that would last a year.
The police force involved said it “attended to assist medical professionals and ensure necessary statutory processes were followed” – as they would “with any involving the potential for the sudden unexplained death of a baby or a child”.
“It was quickly identified that there was information to suggest a criminal offence may have been committed,” the force added.
Sarah’s case was dropped earlier this year and is no longer active.
Her story comes as the British Society of Abortion Care Providers and the British Pregnancy Advice Service (BPAS) – one of the main licensed abortion clinics – today issue a statement saying women under investigation on suspicion of illegally abortions are “incredibly distressed” that a vote on abortion law won’t take place this parliamentary term.
“As soon as the new parliament returns in July, it must urgently act,” BPAS says.
Before the general election was called, MPs were due to debate abortion law.
Amendments to the Criminal Justice Bill aimed at stopping women facing criminal sanction for ending their pregnancy had been proposed.
‘A national scandal’
“There’s an increasing number of women who are facing investigation and suspicion that they have had an illegal abortion,” says Jonathan Lord, an NHS consultant gynaecologist and co-chair of the British Society of Abortion Care Providers.
Anecdotally, he knows of up to 100 women who have been investigated in the last year, which he says is “unprecedented”.
“What these women are going through and the horrific way they’ve been treated… it’s a national scandal,” he adds.
Some women have been treated in a ‘horrific’ way, says Dr Lord
Dr Lord says he’s seen a rise in police approaching abortion providers for records and information about women who had considered an abortion.
Responding to police inquiries has become a “major” part of his job.
“In no other field of medicine would you expect the police to ask for medical records, they are confidential for a reason,” he tells Sky News.
The official numbers are lower than what Dr Lord reports, but still at record levels.
Between 2022 and 2023, 29 people in England and Wales were recorded as under police investigation on suspicion of procuring an illegal abortion – the highest in two decades.
Police investigations into abortions are at the highest levels in two decades
And Freedom of Information data for Sky News shows there’s been a rise in the number of people taken to court for this offence.
Between 2010 and 2019, 17 cases reached court in England and Wales. Only six of those cases resulted in a conviction. That’s about a third.
But in just a few years, between 2020 and 2023, 11 cases went to court. Almost half of those (five) resulted in a conviction.
An illegal abortion is any attempt to procure a miscarriage where it’s not signed off by two doctors, or the medication hasn’t been prescribed.
Experts can’t fully explain what is fuelling this but suggest a combination of factors might be at play, including increased police awareness of the ease of “at home” abortions.
‘Prosecutions not in public interest’
In England, Wales and Scotland, it is legal to terminate a pregnancy up to 24 weeks in an NHS clinic or approved abortion provider, with the permission of two doctors. In Northern Ireland, abortion was fully decriminalised in 2020.
Women can have a surgical abortion or they can take two pills – known as a medical termination.
Since COVID, the “pills by post” scheme became a permanent measure. It means both pills can be taken at home in the early stages of pregnancy following an online telephone consultation.
Misoprostol is one of the pills used legally in the UK to terminate a pregnancy
Having a termination outside of these circumstances in England and Wales is illegal under the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act. The maximum penalty is life in prison.
“I think abortion care should come under the umbrella of healthcare,” says Lucie Baylis, an unplanned pregnancy nurse at Royal Cornwall NHS hospital.
“I don’t think there is any public interest in prosecuting women who seek abortion outside of the legal parameters.”
Earlier this year, new guidance was issued by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists urging medics not to report patients if they suspect a woman of illegally ending their own pregnancy.
Ms Baylis says ‘it seems mad’ women are pursued by police
In the first official guidance issued of its kind, it says a healthcare worker must “justify” any disclosure of patient data or face “potential fitness to practise proceedings”.
Ms Baylis said “it seems mad” women should be passed to police or authorities rather than handled as a healthcare patient.
‘Law should follow the science’
But others think moves to change the law are “irresponsible” and “would only have the impact of incentivising women to have late-term abortions by themselves, with no medical oversights,” says Calum Miller, a doctor and medical ethics professor at the University of Oxford.
“The current law acts as a deterrent to stop this,” he says.
“Data from other countries is very clear that when you make a certain kind of abortion legal, it does become more common.
“As an example, in New Zealand, there was a 43% increase in abortions after 20 weeks,” he says.
Dr Miller feels proposed amendments have the aim of “legalising abortion up until birth, which isn’t in step with British public opinion”.
Dr Miller says proposed law changes aren’t in step with public opinion
In an October YouGov poll, 25% of people said they thought the current 24-week legal limit was too late and should be reduced, while 49% said it was about right, and 6% believed it should be extended.
“Abortion laws should follow the science. And it should say at the very least that if a baby is potentially viable, abortion should not be an option,” says Dr Miller.
While Sarah accepts why she was investigated – for looking for pills online – she is still struggling with the impact the investigation has had on her life.
“It never leaves your mind,” she says.
“Having to live with it for 50-odd weeks… You think ‘am I going to get a knock on the door? Are we going to get taken away?'”
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The police force involved with Sarah’s case told us: “Immediate action was taken to secure evidence to ensure that a thorough investigation could take place.
“This was a complex investigation, requiring extensive forensic and medical evidence, and unfortunately these kind of enquiries take time.”
The National Police Chiefs’ Council and the Crown Prosecution Service also say these investigations are “rare” and “would only be initiated where there is credible information to suggest criminal activity… often as a result of concerns raised from medical professionals”.
They say they come with “unique” factors and “personal circumstances” that are “carefully” considered.
UK
Election 2024: I spent a week travelling on night buses to see a view of the UK politicians don’t
There is a rhythm to a night at the Bolton Interchange.
People dart from arriving buses, racing across the concourse to catch departing ones. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t. Each rush is followed by a brief lull.
Every night, hundreds of lives intersect at the Bolton Interchange. The night-shift workers and commuters, those out on the town and those just a little bit lost.
Each one has their own story, some are happy to chat, most lose themselves in whatever is playing through their headphones.
I spent a week on the night buses. With the election looming, what the politicians are experiencing on their campaign battle buses is not what ordinary people are seeing. Theirs is a very different perspective.
Sky News’s Greg Milam spoke to passengers on night buses
There is an unmistakeable despair about the state of the country, an indifference to what the political process might do about it and a dark humour about the future. There are very few flickers of optimism.
From the bus-spotter who says the country needs “a good clean”, to those who yearn for a Britain of a different age, to Pete, the elderly bluegrass guitarist heading for an open-mic night.
What does he think of Britain today? “Me and 50 mates are going to go to Lake Windermere to take a s*** in the water. We’ll see if they do anything to stop us, because they don’t seem to be stopping the water companies.”
It is just one of the many raw expressions of the frustration and hopelessness that I hear. As Carl, the night supervisor at the interchange, says: “Late shifts are different here. It is a real eye-opener.”
‘Vote? I just can’t be bothered’
With her shock of white hair and ankle-length peach quilted coat, Sophia Talbot is hard to miss as she jogs across the interchange concourse. She turned 80 a few weeks ago but is still working full-time. She is taking the 125 bus home after completing filming in Bolton as an extra on the TV drama, Waterloo Road.
Sophia: The country is a mess. When I first came to Bolton 21 years ago it was a really nice place and now it’s all run down and boarded up and I think that speaks for everywhere.
Every time I go to the supermarket, I seem to get less for my money. I can drive but I can’t afford a car so that’s why I take the bus.
I do the extras work for a bit of extra money. Extra extra money, I call it.
I don’t think I’ll last long enough to see things in this country change for the better. It will take a long time for that to happen because it has gone down too far.
I probably won’t even vote. I didn’t last time or the time before if I remember right. I just can’t be bothered, and I know that’s not good because if you don’t do it, you can’t blame anybody but yourself, can you?
‘I’m treated as third class, common muck’
It is just after 8pm, still light on this early summer evening, and Janey Fairhurst is passing through the interchange on her way from Bury to Wigan, after spending the day with a bereaved friend. She lost her job in medical research in November and, after 10 interviews, is still searching for work.
Janey: My life is drastically different to what it was. There are just not enough jobs. There are jobs down South but I feel the North gets forgotten about quite a lot when it comes to politics. Maybe they need to remember that we started the industrial revolution and they wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for that so maybe give the North some more funding and more jobs.
The empire is over, Britain has just crumbled, it has been going in the wrong direction for a long time and there’s no trust between the people and the politicians.
When I was in work I felt like I was winning. I could buy the Tropicana instead of Tesco’s own brand orange juice. You don’t really think about the politics of it all when you’ve got the money.
Now, I feel like I’m treated as third class, common muck and I’m not. I come from a good family. I feel frustrated, angry, sad, belittled, in a way – judged. I worked so hard to get where I was and now I can’t get back into it.
‘The cost of living has put a lot on people’
Three buses in the morning and three more in the evening are the routine of Saila Shabir’s working life. From her home in Great Lever to her job in Manchester, she says her time spent travelling has given her perspective on the value of community and the state of the country.
Saila: I think it wouldn’t do any harm for everyone to get on the night bus and experience life from this side of things. It might not be their cup of tea but it is a way to understand what people are saying and doing.
I find it uplifting travelling on the bus in the evening because you get to see people from all sorts of backgrounds. It is amazing, really, and it opens your mind that there’s huge prospects and a really expansive community that we could all bring together under one roof.
I’m not going to say I’m despairing but the cost of living has put a lot on people. People need to work together, we can’t just rely on one set of people to do it all. I am hopeful because I do trust the right people will do the job properly. I do see the darker side of life on the buses sometimes but you need the dark to see the light.
‘I have never known this country in such a state’
From his blue suede boots to his embroidered collar, Rick Conlon is dressed for a night on the town. It is 11pm and he is making his way home to Rochdale. At 6ft4in with a shaved head, it’s easy to see why he’s well known in local boxing circles. He is jovial despite despairing of Britain today.
Rick: I’m 58 and I’m not political particularly but I have never known this country in such a state. I just think it’s really tough at the moment. I know inflation has come down but there’s a lot of people far worse off than me struggling for food and the basic necessities.
We’re the fifth-richest country in the world, I find it incredible. When I was 16, 17, 18, in Margaret Thatcher’s time, 1981 and 1982, with all that political and social unrest, the country was still a better country. We had massive unemployment but the country was still a better country. People were looked after.
There’s that old saying about how you can judge a country by how it looks after its elderly. It’s just ridiculous how little they’re paid and how little they’re thought of.
If there’s one thing that makes me optimistic, bus fares make me optimistic. Two pounds – you can’t argue with that. Even then they’re probably subsidised but that’s great, because this is a great country, it’s just the government letting us down.
‘If it was up to me, I’d move country’
Muj Malik is travelling home with his partner Tabitha and five-month-old son, Zair, after another exhausting day searching for a new family home. They have faced months of frustration on growing council house waiting lists and, they say, see countless videos on TikTok from other young families in the same situation.
Muj: Things are not good in this country. My grandma moved here from Pakistan and my mum was born here so I’m third generation but, if it was up to me, I’d move country. I don’t want to live here for the rest of my life. I don’t see the point because the country is just going sideways.
At the end of the day, I’ve got a mixed-race baby, I grew up in a predominantly white area. I like the country and the people and I know there are people far worse off than us. But you’ve got war veterans from this country, people who have gone to war for this country, they’ve put their lives on the line, they’ve lost friends, and you’ve got them sitting outside of Asda homeless with no help whatsoever.
This country is fading miserably. I like the people, it’s not about the people, it’s about the way the country is run.
New details have been unveiled for Universal’s first UK theme park – including plans for the attraction to be open 365 days a year.
Universal Destinations & Experiences – which is owned by Sky’s parent company Comcast – has bought land near Bedford as it plans to build Europe’s largest theme park with millions of visitors per year, as well as a 500-room hotel and dining area.
Economic benefits
Universal’s economic impact analysis, produced in line with HM Treasury guidelines on economic appraisal and published today suggests the attraction will generate nearly £50bn of economic benefits for the UK.
It said the net economic contribution of the potential project for the UK was forecast to be £35.1bn over the construction period and first 20 years of operation.
Up to a further £14.1bn was expected to be generated in extra taxes for the exchequer over the same period.
The analysis suggests the project will generate 20,000 jobs during the construction period which, at its peak, will see 5,000 workers on the site.
Once operational, it is expected to create an initial 8,000 new jobs, rising over time. The company has made a commitment to pay the living wage to employees.
‘The best location we’ve ever seen’
Universal has acquired almost 500 acres for the site, which is just south of Bedford between Kempston, Wootton, Stewartby and Wixams, with an option to buy up to a further 200 acres.
A map showing the land Universal has purchased
The new park, which would have a construction period of around six years, would be built on land once occupied by Kempston Hardwick brickworks, once the world’s largest brickworks in terms of output, which closed in 2008 and which was demolished in September 2021.
“I can tell you it’s going to be a world-class park with all experiences that people will love based upon the most popular films, video games and stories that people have enjoyed for decades,” said Page Thompson, the company’s president in charge of new ventures.
“We’ve spent the last decade looking all over Europe and the United Kingdom for locations, and we think this is the best location we’ve ever seen.”
Universal Destinations & Experiences currently has five theme parks around the world – in the United States, Japan, China and Singapore.
Disneyland Paris, which with the associated Walt Disney Studios Park is currently Europe’s biggest theme park, attracts around 15 million visitors per year.
New details
“Our phase one plans consist of a theme park, a 500-room hotel and a dining area that people can come to even if they don’t have a theme park ticket,” Mr Thompson told Sky News.
“Over time, I would expect the number of hotels to grow.
“Our intention is that this park would be open 365 days a year, just like all of our other major theme parks.
“We have a whole series of special events, like our Halloween Horror Nights and carnival parties… and it just allows us to attract people throughout this time.”
Universal said evidence from its other theme parks suggested that for every job supported within the parks at least 1.5 further jobs could be supported in the supply chain and neighbouring parts of the economy – leading to its expectation of a net additional 20,000 jobs.
Plenty of competition
The investment is not without risks and not least because of its scale.
Of Europe’s 20 most visited theme parks, four – Legoland Windsor, Alton Towers, Chessington World of Adventures and Thorpe Park – are in the UK, all owned by the former FTSE-100 giant Merlin Entertainments. Their combined visitor numbers annually come to around half of what Universal is targeting.
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
There is also plenty of competition.
Locally, not far from the proposed Bedfordshire site is the Harry Potter Experience at the Warner Bros studio tour near Watford, while there is Woburn Safari Park to the immediate north and Whipsnade Zoo to the immediate west of Luton.
There is no shortage of quality options for family days out. Further afield Europe already has more than 1,000 theme and amusement parks, many of them owned by Merlin, renowned for its astute management.
The weather issue
A third factor, potentially, is the weather. This is something that already handicaps a lot of theme parks in northern Europe, such as Liseberg in the Swedish city of Gothenburg, the Tivoli Gardens in the Danish capital Copenhagen and the original Legoland, in the Danish city of Billund, which close for some or all of the winter. So does Phantasialand, one of Germany’s biggest and most popular attractions.
Universal Destinations & Experiences, however, is thought to be undeterred by the English weather and points to the fact that the weather is not always perfect in other parts of the world in which it operates, most notably China and Japan.
The Paris experience
The company also appears undeterred by the experience of Disney in Paris.
The original Euro Disney was loss-making for many years – partly due to mismanagement and partly due to a misunderstanding of what European and particularly French consumers were looking for – and it has only really been since it was fully consumed by the Walt Disney Company, in 2017, that it has been effectively run.
Transport challenges
Another big risk is the transport links. Universal Destinations & Experiences – the name was changed last year from Universal Parks & Resorts to better reflect the kind of services customers will be offered in future in both the physical and virtual worlds – has selected the site primarily for its rail and road links to London and, with one in three visitors expected to come from overseas, for its proximity to Luton Airport.
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Yet those links are not currently up to handling the kind of visitor numbers Universal Destinations & Experiences is expecting.
The M1, the main road link to London, is frequently congested around the Luton turn-off at junction 10 and the road links from there to the site in need of improvement.
Accordingly, Universal Destinations & Experiences will be seeking government incentives to invest in local road and rail links.
Support could also come from East West Rail, the proposed new main line railway connecting East Anglia and South Wales, the first phase of which is a line between Oxford and Cambridge and for which a new station at Kempston Hardwick – whose existing station backs onto the land the park would operate – has been proposed.
The planning process
Riskiest of all, perhaps, is the planning process. Local businesses and MPs are supportive while both Jeremy Hunt, the Chancellor and Mark Harper, the Transport Secretary, have been briefed on the project. Planning proposals have been submitted and Universal Destinations & Experiences has held talks with Bedford Borough and Central Bedfordshire Councils.
However, Mr Thompson confirmed that Universal Destinations & Experiences is seeking planning permission via a so-called special development order – which would take the decision out of the hands of the local authorities and instead leave the final decision on planning consent with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.
A roll of the dice
So this is a big roll of the dice by Universal Destinations & Experiences.
The investment – the first phase of which will be several billion pounds – will take many years to pay off while thrill-seekers should probably not expect the resort to be up and running much before the end of the decade.
However, starting with a blank sheet of paper as it opens its first European venue, Universal Destinations & Experiences has the opportunity to bring something genuinely new not just to the UK but to Europe.
The name change made by the business last year reflects the fact that, in future, the business expects to be offering branded entertainment, culinary, gaming and consumer product experiences that go a lot further than the traditional theme park and resort offerings.
There could even be experiences at the resort which have yet to be conceived. It could be quite the ride.
A man has been arrested as part of the police investigation into the Westminster honeytrap scandal.
The Metropolitan Police said they arrested a man in Islington, north London, on Wednesday morning on suspicion of harassment and offences under the Online Safety Act.
Multiple victims were informed by the police shortly afterwards.
Earlier this year, several men, working mostly in politics, said they had received unsolicited, flirtatious WhatsApp messages from people calling themselves “Charlie” or “Abi”.
Explicit images were exchanged in some instances.
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A Met Police spokesman said: “On Wednesday, 26 June, police executed a warrant at an address in Islington.
“A man was arrested on suspicion of harassment and committing offences under the Online Safety Act. He was taken into custody where he remains.
“The arrest relates to an investigation being carried out by the Met’s Parliamentary Liaison and Investigation Team following reports of unsolicited messages sent to MPs and others.
“The investigation remains ongoing.”
William Wragg stepped down from the Conservative Party when the scandal erupted in April after sharing other politicians’ personal numbers to someone he met on a dating app who threatened to release compromising information and pictures he had sent them.
Conservative Dr Luke Evans also revealed he was approached in March by two different numbers on WhatsApp “who purported to know me”.
He said he was the victim of cyber flashing and malicious communications “and blew the whistle by reporting it to the police and the parliamentary authorities as soon as this happened”.
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