Thousands Rally against Abortion on Britain’s 40th Anniversary of Legalisation

By Hilary White
 
  LONDON, October 29, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – While British Parliamentarians debate in committee whether the gestational time limit of 24 weeks for legal abortion is too low or too high, thousands rallied outside the Houses of Parliament on Saturday for an end to the legal killing of Britain’s children. The protest started the night before when pro-life activists projected the number of abortions on to the riverside face of Parliament.
 
  From the rally, the demonstrators marched to the nearby Westminster Cathedral for a prayer vigil. Organisers said that pro-life efforts in Britain are focused on incremental gains such as lowering the gestational age limit to match the 12 week limit of other European countries. 
                                                                                                                 
  British pro-life groups are using the anniversary to bring public awareness to the issue. Remembrance services are planned across the country for the more than 6 million children who have lost their lives to legal abortion since 1967.
 
  The BBC said that in the first year of legalisation, there were some 20,000 abortions in Britain. Since then the number has grown to nearly 200,000 a year, about 450 a day, with the rate rising every year. At the current rate, a staggering one in five British pregnancies ends with the child being killed.
 
  But others say that there is a growing opposition in British society to abortion, especially with the advent of advanced ultra sound technology that has shown the child in the womb “walking” and moving. Andrea Minichiello Williams, public policy officer of the Lawyers’ Christian Fellowship told reporters, “Ministers are currently ignoring a major public mood-swing. Most people are dissatisfied with high abortion rates and want a reduction in the time limit on abortions.”
 
  Britain was one of the first countries in the world to legalise abortion, and since then has been at the forefront of most of the anti-life legislation and scientific research, especially in the field of in vitro fertilisation and embryonic research.
 
  Last week, the man whose private member’s bill brought legalised abortion to Britain, Lord David Steel, told newspaper reporters that there were simply too many abortions and complained that women had begun to use it as a form of long-term contraception. He urged British women to be “more responsible” but saw no reason for lowering the gestational age limit.
           
  Labour Health Minister Dawn Primarolo said on Wednesday that the government had seen nothing in the Committee presentations to indicate a “medical case” for lowering the age limit.